IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hhs/iuiwop/0677.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Why Does Sovereign Risk Differ for Domestic and Foreign Investors? Evidence from Scandinavia, 1938­­–1948

Author

Listed:

Abstract

Recent theoretical models suggest that the costs governments face when defaulting on their domestic and external debt may differ considerably. This paper examines if this proposed cost difference is reflected in sovereign risk spreads across domestic and foreign markets. Specifically, I analyze market yields on Danish government debt in both Denmark and Sweden during 1938–1948, i.e., a period full of political shocks as well as a wartime segmentation of Scandinavian capital markets. By linking the exogenous wartime shocks to changes in the costs of defaulting on domestic and external sovereign debt, it is found that these costs explain a significant part of the variation in the sovereign risk spread across markets. The result is robust to a multitude of tests and the inclusion of additional yield spread influences such as differences in macroeconomic fluctuations, portfolio allocation opportunities, local risk aversion and microstructure institutions.

Suggested Citation

  • Waldenström, Daniel, 2006. "Why Does Sovereign Risk Differ for Domestic and Foreign Investors? Evidence from Scandinavia, 1938­­–1948," Working Paper Series 677, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
  • Handle: RePEc:hhs:iuiwop:0677
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.ifn.se/Wfiles/wp/wp677.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff & Miguel A. Savastano, 2003. "Debt Intolerance," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 34(1), pages 1-74.
    2. repec:rus:hseeco:123922 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Brian D. Wright & Kenneth M. Kletzer, 2000. "Sovereign Debt as Intertemporal Barter," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(3), pages 621-639, June.
    4. Bulow, Jeremy & Rogoff, Kenneth, 1989. "Sovereign Debt: Is to Forgive to Forget?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(1), pages 43-50, March.
    5. Paolo Mauro & Nathan Sussman & Yishay Yafeh, 2002. "Emerging Market Spreads: Then versus Now," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 117(2), pages 695-733.
    6. Weder di Mauro, Beatrice & Van Rijckeghem, Caroline, 2004. "The Politics Of Debt Crises," CEPR Discussion Papers 4683, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    7. Bulow, Jeremy & Rogoff, Kenneth, 1989. "A Constant Recontracting Model of Sovereign Debt," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 97(1), pages 155-178, February.
    8. Rose, Andrew K., 2005. "One reason countries pay their debts: renegotiation and international trade," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 77(1), pages 189-206, June.
    9. Karolyi, G. Andrew & Stulz, Rene M., 2003. "Are financial assets priced locally or globally?," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, in: G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Finance, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 16, pages 975-1020, Elsevier.
    10. Lothian, James R., 2002. "The internationalization of money and finance and the globalization of financial markets," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 21(6), pages 699-724, November.
    11. G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), 2003. "Handbook of the Economics of Finance," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 1, number 1.
    12. Charemza, Wojciech W. & Majerowska, Ewa, 2000. "Regulation of the Warsaw Stock Exchange: The portfolio allocation problem," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 24(4), pages 555-576, April.
    13. Newey, Whitney & West, Kenneth, 2014. "A simple, positive semi-definite, heteroscedasticity and autocorrelation consistent covariance matrix," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 33(1), pages 125-132.
    14. G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), 2003. "Handbook of the Economics of Finance," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 1, number 2.
    15. Chinn, Menzie D., 2006. "The (partial) rehabilitation of interest rate parity in the floating rate era: Longer horizons, alternative expectations, and emerging markets," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 7-21, February.
    16. Lothian, James R. & Wu, Liuren, 2011. "Uncovered interest-rate parity over the past two centuries," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 448-473, April.
    17. Jonathan Eaton & Mark Gersovitz, 1981. "Debt with Potential Repudiation: Theoretical and Empirical Analysis," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 48(2), pages 289-309.
    18. Daniel Waldenstrom & Bruno S. Frey, 2006. "Using Markets to Measure Pre-War Threat Assessments: The Nordic Countries facing World War II," CREMA Working Paper Series 2006-27, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Daniel Waldenstrom & Bruno S. Frey, 2006. "Using Markets to Measure Pre-War Threat Assessments: The Nordic Countries facing World War II," CREMA Working Paper Series 2006-27, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    2. Waldenström, Daniel & Frey, Bruno S., 2008. "Did nordic countries recognize the gathering storm of World War II? Evidence from the bond markets," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 45(2), pages 107-126, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Waldenström, Daniel, 2010. "Why does sovereign risk differ for domestic and external debt? Evidence from Scandinavia, 1938-1948," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 29(3), pages 387-402, April.
    2. Waldenström, Daniel, 2005. "Does Sovereign Risk Differ for Domestic and Foreign Investors? Historical Evidence from Scandinavian Bond Markets," SSE/EFI Working Paper Series in Economics and Finance 585, Stockholm School of Economics, revised 18 Feb 2005.
    3. Eduardo Borensztein & Ugo Panizza, 2009. "The Costs of Sovereign Default," IMF Staff Papers, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 56(4), pages 683-741, November.
    4. Ms. Ana L Fostel & Sandeep Kapur & Mr. Luis Catão, 2007. "Persistent Gaps, Volatility Types, and Default Traps," IMF Working Papers 2007/148, International Monetary Fund.
    5. Silvia Marchesi & Tania Masi, 2019. "Sovereign risk after sovereign restructuring. Private and official default," Working Papers 423, University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics, revised Nov 2019.
    6. Fernando Broner & Alberto Martin & Jaume Ventura, 2010. "Sovereign Risk and Secondary Markets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(4), pages 1523-1555, September.
    7. Francesca Caselli & Matilde Faralli & Paolo Manasse & Ugo Panizza, 2021. "On the Benefits of Repaying," IMF Working Papers 2021/233, International Monetary Fund.
    8. Filippo Brutti & Philip Sauré, 2016. "Repatriation of Debt in the Euro Crisis," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 14(1), pages 145-174.
    9. Mauricio Drelichman & Hans-Joachim Voth, 2015. "Risk sharing with the monarch: contingent debt and excusable defaults in the age of Philip II, 1556–1598," Cliometrica, Journal of Historical Economics and Econometric History, Association Française de Cliométrie (AFC), vol. 9(1), pages 49-75, January.
    10. Gelos, R. Gaston & Sahay, Ratna & Sandleris, Guido, 2011. "Sovereign borrowing by developing countries: What determines market access?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(2), pages 243-254, March.
    11. Cuadra, Gabriel & Sapriza, Horacio, 2008. "Sovereign default, interest rates and political uncertainty in emerging markets," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(1), pages 78-88, September.
    12. Fernando Broner & Jaume Ventura, 2011. "Globalization and Risk Sharing," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 78(1), pages 49-82.
    13. Trebesch, Christoph & Zabel, Michael, 2017. "The output costs of hard and soft sovereign default," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 416-432.
    14. Silvia Marchesi, 2016. "Life after default? Private vs. official sovereign debt restructurings," Development Working Papers 398, Centro Studi Luca d'Agliano, University of Milano, revised 26 Aug 2016.
    15. Aguiar, Mark & Gopinath, Gita, 2006. "Defaultable debt, interest rates and the current account," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(1), pages 64-83, June.
    16. Yue, Vivian Z., 2010. "Sovereign default and debt renegotiation," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(2), pages 176-187, March.
    17. Silvia, Marchesi, 2015. "The cost of default: private vs. official sovereign debt restructurings," Working Papers 320, University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics, revised 28 Dec 2015.
    18. Kris James Mitchener & Marc D. Weidenmier, 2005. "Supersanctions and Sovereign Debt Repayment," NBER Working Papers 11472, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Weidenmier, Marc D., 2005. "Gunboats, reputation, and sovereign repayment: lessons from the Southern Confederacy," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2), pages 407-422, July.
    20. Mauricio Drelichman & Hans‐Joachim Voth, 2011. "Lending to the Borrower from Hell: Debt and Default in the Age of Philip II," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 121(557), pages 1205-1227, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Sovereign Risk; Investor Heterogeneity; Domestic Debt; External Debt; Market Segmentation; Political Economy; Cliometrics;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F34 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - International Lending and Debt Problems
    • G15 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - International Financial Markets
    • G18 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Government Policy and Regulation
    • N20 - Economic History - - Financial Markets and Institutions - - - General, International, or Comparative
    • N24 - Economic History - - Financial Markets and Institutions - - - Europe: 1913-
    • N44 - Economic History - - Government, War, Law, International Relations, and Regulation - - - Europe: 1913-

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hhs:iuiwop:0677. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Elisabeth Gustafsson (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iuiiise.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.