623 research outputs found
Derivative pricing for a multi-curve extension of the Gaussian, exponentially quadratic short rate model
The recent financial crisis has led to so-called multi-curve models for the
term structure. Here we study a multi-curve extension of short rate models
where, in addition to the short rate itself, we introduce short rate spreads.
In particular, we consider a Gaussian factor model where the short rate and the
spreads are second order polynomials of Gaussian factor processes. This leads
to an exponentially quadratic model class that is less well known than the
exponentially affine class. In the latter class the factors enter linearly and
for positivity one considers square root factor processes. While the square
root factors in the affine class have more involved distributions, in the
quadratic class the factors remain Gaussian and this leads to various
advantages, in particular for derivative pricing. After some preliminaries on
martingale modeling in the multi-curve setup, we concentrate on pricing of
linear and optional derivatives. For linear derivatives, we exhibit an
adjustment factor that allows one to pass from pre-crisis single curve values
to the corresponding post-crisis multi-curve values
Corporate bond prices and idiosyncratic risk: evidence from Australia
In this paper we investigate the bond price effect upon the information arrival of firm-specific idiosyncratic risk. We consider idiosyncratic dispersion and idiosyncratic volatility that capture, respectively, the direction of information and the magnitude of idiosyncratic risk. We find that idiosyncratic volatility does not affect bond prices, while the direction of idiosyncratic risk which reflects the favorable or unfavorable information exhibits impacts on bond prices. Idiosyncratic dispersion in the stock return of a firm in the preceding week, in general, is positively associated with bond price changes in the current week. This effect is most pronounced for firms exhibiting characteristics associated with lower default risk
Implications of return predictability for consumption dynamics and asset pricing
Two broad classes of consumption dynamics—long-run risks and rare disasters—have proven successful in explaining the equity premium puzzle when used in conjunction with recursive preferences. We show that bounds a-là Gallant, Hansen, and Tauchen that restrict the volatility of the stochastic discount factor by conditioning on a set of return predictors constitute a useful tool to discriminate between these alternative dynamics. In particular, we document that models that rely on rare disasters meet comfortably the bounds independently of the forecasting horizon and the asset returns used to construct the bounds. However, the specific nature of disasters is a relevant characteristic at the 1-year horizon: disasters that unfold over multiple years are more successful in meeting the predictors-based bounds than one-period disasters. Instead, at the 5-year horizon, the sole presence of disasters—even if one-period and permanent—is sufficient for the model to satisfy the bounds. Finally, the bounds point to multiple volatility components in consumption as a promising dimension for long-run risk models
Financial Market Implications of the Federal Debt Paydown
U.S. Treasury securities fill several crucial roles in financial markets: they are a risk-free benchmark, a reference and hedging benchmark, and a reserve asset to the Federal Reserve and other financial institutions. Many of the features that make the Treasury market an attractive benchmark and reserve asset are likely to be adversely affected by the paydown of the federal debt, and recent developments suggest that this may be happening already. Market participants are responding by moving away from Treasuries as a reference and hedging benchmark toward agency debt securities, corporate debt securities, and interest rate swaps. The Federal Reserve is taking steps to adjust its portfolio and should be able to do so with minimal implications for monetary policy
Interest Rates Under Falling Stars
Theory predicts that the equilibrium real interest rate, r*t, and the perceived trend in inflation, ð*t, are key determinants of the term structure of interest rates. However, term structure analyses generally assume that these endpoints are constant. Instead, we show that allowing for time variation in both r*t and ð*t is crucial for understanding the empirical dynamics of U.S. Treasury yields and risk pricing. Our evidence reveals that accounting for fluctuations in both r*t and ð*t substantially increases the accuracy of long-range interest rate forecasts, helps predict excess bond returns, improves estimates of the term premium in long-term interest rates, and captures a substantial share of interest rate variability at low frequencies
Modelling credit spreads with time volatility, skewness, and kurtosis
This paper seeks to identify the macroeconomic and financial factors that drive credit spreads on bond indices in the US credit market. To overcome the idiosyncratic nature of credit spread data reflected in time varying volatility, skewness and thick tails, it proposes asymmetric GARCH models with alternative probability density functions. The results show that credit spread changes are mainly explained by the interest rate and interest rate volatility, the slope of the yield curve, stock market returns and volatility, the state of liquidity in the corporate bond market and, a heretofore overlooked variable, the foreign exchange rate. They also confirm that the asymmetric GARCH models and Student-t distributions are systematically superior to the conventional GARCH model and the normal distribution in in-sample and out-of-sample testing
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