Risk Premia in General Equilibrium

This paper shows that non-linearities imposed by a neoclassical production function alone can generate time-varying and asymmetric risk premia over the business cycle. These (empirical) key features become relevant, and asset market implications improve substantially when we allow for non-normalities in the form of rare disasters. We employ analytical solutions of dynamic stochastic general equilibrium models, including a novel solution with endogenous labor supply, to obtain closed-form expressions for the risk premium in production economies. In contrast to endowment economies, the curvature of the policy functions affects the risk premium through controlling the individual's effective risk aversion

Credit Expansions and Financial Crises: The Roles of Household and Firm Credit

The literature has identified credit expansions to the private sector as an important predictor of financial crises in developing countries. We extend the literature by decomposing credit into credit extended to households and credit extended to firms. We compile a unique disaggregated data set and find evidence that household credit growth and firm credit growth have positive, distinct, and statistically significant effects on the likelihood of banking and currency crises. Furthermore, household credit growth is a particularly important predictor of banking crises in countries with a high propensity to consume. Working Paper 06-5