Banks’ intraday liquidity management during operational outages: Theory and evidence from the UK payment system

We investigate how settlement banks in the United Kingdom’s large-value payment system deal with intraday liquidity and operational risk. In particular, we are interested in payments behaviour towards a bank that is, for operational reasons, unable to make but able to receive payments. If other banks did not sufficiently monitor their outgoing payments, these operational shocks could impact the entire payment system because the affected bank could absorb liquidity from the system. Our game-theoretic model predicts that only early in the day, when they are uncertain about the payment instructions they might have to execute, banks stop sending payments to a counterparty which is unable to make payments. Using a non-parametric method, we find that this prediction is supported by the data, implying that banks effectively contain the disruption caused by the operational outage: payment flows between healthy banks remain unaffected.     

Nonlinear Pricing and the Market for Settling Payments

Fedwire Funds is a real‐time gross settlement system that uses a decreasing block pricing scheme to attract nonurgent payments. A bank's optimal response to Fedwire's pricing depends on its perceived benefits to settling nonurgent payments quickly. If the urgency for immediate settlement is great enough, a bank responds to marginal price; otherwise, it responds to average price. We find banks respond to average price, suggesting that Fedwire's advantage over competing services of being able to provide immediate settlement is small. Moreover, attempts to increase demand for Fedwire services by lowering the cost of banks' final block of payments may be ineffective if there is not a corresponding decrease in average cost.     

How to get banks to take less risk and disclose bad news

There is wide agreement that before the recent financial crisis, financial institutions took excessive risk in their investment strategies. At the same time, regulators complained that banks did not reveal the extent of their difficulties in a timely fashion thus reducing the effectiveness of government intervention to prevent or mitigate the deleterious effects of the financial crisis. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how regulators can best use certain tools at their disposal to motivate banks to take less risk and to provide adverse information to regulators early. We argue that two tools, namely (i) allowing bank payouts to equity holders even when banks report they are in trouble and (ii) constraining banks’ future investment strategy when they are in trouble can achieve both goals. We show that, in some cases, it is optimal to use both of these tools in combination. That is, in such cases it is optimal to allow equity payouts when banks report they are in trouble, even though such payouts increase the incentive for banks to take excessive risk and even though these payments are financed by taxpayers. We also show that the more socially costly is constraining the bank’s portfolio selection or the more complex are the bank’s assets, the more likely it is that allowing larger payouts and fewer constraints is optimal. Finally we discuss how changes in bank capital requirements interact with inducing disclosure and preventing excessive risk taking.     

A Prudential Paradox: The Signal in (Not) Restricting Bank Dividends

By restricting dividends in the weakest banks, prudential regulators counterintuitively induce more capital payouts in marginal banks. The potential for bank runs exacerbates the incentive to signal strength through dividend payments. Regulatory restrictions on those payments can be used to achieve the first-best outcome, but only if the prevailing capital requirements are sufficiently high. In a crisis, the optimal dividend policy is more restrictive, since it allows the weak but solvent banks to pool with the strong. Finally, we show that the optimal release of regulatory bank information depends critically on the regulator's information and dividend restriction policies.     

Illiquidity in the Interbank Payment System Following Wide‐Scale Disruptions

We show how the interbank payment system can become illiquid following wide‐scale disruptions. Two forces are at play in such disruptions—operational problems and changes in participants’ behavior. If the disruption is large enough, hits a key geographic area, or hits a “too‐big‐to‐fail” participant, then the smooth processing of payments can break down, and central bank intervention might be required to reestablish the socially efficient equilibrium. The paper provides a theoretical framework to analyze the effects of events such as the September 11 attack. In addition, the model can be reinterpreted to analyze shocks to fundamentals that affect the parameters of the intraday liquidity management game. We demonstrate this by showing how processing behavior changed in response to heightened credit risk at the time of the Lehman Brothers failure.     

Risk-shifting and the regulation of bank CEOs’ compensation

This paper analyzes the effects of two regulatory mechanisms, namely a regulation of the structure of bank CEOs incentive pay and sanctions for the CEOs of failed banks, on bank risk shifting. We extend a standard model of CEO compensation by incorporating leverage and an investment decision. To the extent that bank depositors and creditors are even partially protected by public guarantees, we show that it is in the interests of bank shareholders to choose more risky investments than would be socially optimal, and therefore to design a CEO contract with excessive risk taking incentives. Thus, we argue that current corporate governance arrangements in the banking sector are not efficient. In this setting, we show that putting in place one of the aforementioned mechanisms could yield the socially optimal outcome at no cost. We also identify some limitations and potential perverse effects of these mechanisms.     

Risk and concentration in payment and securities settlement systems

What drives the intraday patterns of settlement in payment and securities settlement systems? Using a model of the strategic interaction of participants in these systems to capture some stylized facts about the Federal Reserve's Fedwire funds and securities systems, this paper identifies three factors that influence a participant's decision on when to send transactions intraday: cost of intraday liquidity, extent of settlement risk, and system design. With these factors, the model can make predictions regarding the impact of policy on the concentration of transactions, amount of intraday overdrafts, central bank credit exposure, costs to system participants, and other risks.     

Deposit insurance and subsidized recapitalizations

The 2007–2009 financial crisis saw a vast expansion in deposit insurance guarantees around the world and yet our understanding of the design and consequences of deposit insurance schemes is in its infancy. We provide a new rationale for the provision of deposit insurance. In our model the banking sector exhibits both adverse selection and moral hazard, which implies that the social benefits of bank monitoring must for incentive reasons be shared between depositors and banks. Consequently, socially too few deposits are made in equilibrium. Deposit insurance – or, equivalently, bank recapitalization – corrects this market failure. We find that deposit insurance should be funded not by banks or depositors but out of general taxation. The optimal level of deposit insurance varies inversely with the quality of the banking system. Hence, when the soundness of the financial sector is uncertain, governments should consider supporting deposit insurance schemes and undertaking subsidized recapitalizations.     

Pricing of payment cards, competition, and efficiency: a possible guide for SEPA

This paper analyzes equilibrium pricing of payment cards and welfare consequences of payment card competition. In particular, we model competition between debit and credit cards. The paper argues that optimal consumer and merchant fees must take safety, income uncertainty, default risk, and the merchant’s handling cost of cash into account. Market segmentation where debit and credit cards serve different merchant segments yields a preferred “payment mix”. However, when markets are segmented, payment card fees do not necessarily reach their socially efficient levels. Hence, thoughtful regulatory intervention regarding merchant fees may still be necessary to raise total surplus.     

On the social usefulness of fractional reserve banking

In this paper we argue that if monetary policy has insufficient deflation, private agents have incentives to set up alternative payment systems like fractionally backed bank deposits, which pay interest on the means of payment. In a competitive environment with free entry, these alternative systems are inherently fragile in the sense that they are subject to socially costly bank runs. These social costs are not internalized by private individuals and banks and may exceed their social benefits. We argue that as communication technologies improve, the social benefits of fractional reserve banking decrease, but the private benefits may still exceed the private costs so that such systems continue to be used. In such situations, 100% reserve requirements are optimal.     

The impacts of Net Stable Funding Ratio requirement on Banks’ choices of debt maturity

In this paper, we study the impacts of the Net Stable Funding Ratio (NSFR) requirement on banks’ choices of debt maturity and asset structures, with consequences for banks’ profitability and social welfare. We develop a model in which the manager of a bank determines both debt maturity structure (short-term vs. long-term debt) and asset composition (cash vs. risky assets). To address the incongruence of goals between the bank manager and the bank stakeholders, in our model we assume that the manager receives only a proportion of the bank’s profit in her pay schedule. We demonstrate that the optimal choices of the manager regarding debt maturity and asset structure lead to socially inefficient (second-best) outcomes because the manager internalizes only part of the social benefit. We then study the implications of the NSFR requirement on the manager’s choices and demonstrate that the NSFR requirement can enhance social welfare and reach an efficient (first-best) outcome, if a sufficiently low weight of short-term debt as available stable funding is required by regulation. Further, we find that under the same conditions the NSFR requirement reduces banks’ use of short-term financing and thus increases the probability of banks’ survival and profits from the ex ante point of view, while it decreases banks’ profits from the ex post point of view, since it reduces the threshold for banks’ survival. Our main results have some interesting empirical implications: under certain conditions, the NSFR requirement may reduce both bank failures and banks’ observed profits.     

Optimal pricing of intraday liquidity

This paper presents a general equilibrium model where intraday liquidity is needed because the timing of payments is uncertain. A necessary and sufficient condition for an equilibrium to be efficient is that the nominal intraday interest rate be zero, even when the overnight rate is strictly positive. Because a market for liquidity may not achieve efficiency, this creates a role for the central bank. I allow for the possibility of moral hazard and study policies commonly used by central banks to reduce their exposure to risk. I show collateralized lending achieves the efficient allocation, while, for certain parameters, caps cannot prevent moral hazard.     

非金融支付领域金融消费权益保护研究

近年来,我国非金融支付机构发展快速,为消费者提供了更加高效、便捷的服务,传统意义上以银行为主的支付结算服务得以不断延伸和拓展,弥补了银行服务的不足。随着非金融支付机构竞争加剧,非金融支付服务行业的快速发展与非金融支付领域金融消费权益保护不相匹配的矛盾日益显现,非金融支付领域金融消费权益保护工作需引起关注。     

Benefits from a changing payment technology in European banking

An “output characteristics” cost function is used to identify payment sources of technical change in European banking and estimate associated benefits. As the share of electronic payments in 12 European countries rose from 0.43 in 1987 to 0.79 in 1999 and ATMs expanded while the number of branch offices was constant, bank operating costs are $32 billion lower than they otherwise might have been, saving 0.38% of the 12 nations’ GDP. Policies facilitating these changes (antitrust exemptions to weakly coordinate implementation of payment service pricing) would permit benefits to be more fully realized.     

Liquidity-saving mechanisms in collateral-based RTGS payment systems

This paper studies banks’ incentives regarding the timing of payment submissions in a collateral-based RTGS payment system and how these incentives change with the introduction of a liquidity-saving mechanism (LSM). We show that an LSM allows banks to economise on collateral while also providing incentives to submit payments earlier. This is because in our model an LSM allows payments to be matched and offset in real time without any or very minimal funds. Under a collateral-based RTGS payment system, introduction of the LSM always improves welfare. The result contrasts with earlier work, which shows that under a fee-based RTGS system, the introduction of an LSM in some circumstances may reduce welfare.     

Private payment systems, collateral, and interest rates

Recent developments in private payments arrangements, particularly at the wholesale level, (including recent innovations in China) challenge central banks’ longstanding monopoly on the provision of the ultimate means of settlement for financial transactions. This paper examines competition between public payments arrangements and private intermediaries, and the effect on central banks’ role in monetary policy. Central to the issue is the role of collateral both as a requirement for participation in central bank sponsored payments arrangements and as the backing for private intermediary arrangements. The presence of private systems serves as a check on the ability of a monetary authority to tighten monetary policy.     

Bank funding stability,pricing strategies and the guidance of depositors

Banks face a ‘behavioralization’ of their balance sheets since deposit funding increasingly consists of non-maturing deposits with uncertain cash flows exposing them to asset liability (ALM) risk. Thus, this study examines the behavior of banks’ retail customers regarding non-maturing deposits. Our unique sample comprises the contract and cash flow data for 2.2 million individual contracts from 1991 to 2010. We find that contractual rewards, i.e., qualified interest payments, and government subsidies, effectively stabilize saving behavior and thus bank funding. The probability of an early deposit withdrawal decreases by approximately 40%, and cash flow volatility drops by about 25%. Our findings provide important insights for banks using pricing incentives to steer desired saving patterns for their non-maturing deposit portfolios. Finally, these results are informative regarding the bank liquidity regulations (Basel III) concerning the stability of deposits and the minimum requirements for risk management (European Commission DIRECTIVE 2006/48/EC).     

What is in it for us? Network effects and bank payment innovation

The developed world exhibits substantial but poorly understood differences in the efficiency and quality of low value payment services. This paper compares payment arrangements in the UK, Norway, Sweden, and Finland, and discusses the impact of network effects on incentives to adopt new payments technology. A model is presented, in which private benefits for investment in shared inter-bank payments infrastructure are weak. In contrast, due to ‘account externalities’, there are strong incentives for investment in intra-bank payment systems. These two features, distinguishing bank payments from other network industries, can help explain some of the observed cross-country differences in payment arrangements.     

Is Government Regulation of Banks Necessary?

Banks have been involved with and regulated by governments for hundreds of years. Following a brief review of this history, I delineate nine reasons that could justify continued regulation, particularly in the United States. These include deposit insurance, preventing banks from obtaining excessive economic power, reducing the cost of individual bank insolvency, avoiding the effects of bank failures on the economy, protecting the payments system, serving the interests of popularly elected officials, enhancing the Federal Reserve's control over the money supply, suppressing competition, and protecting consumers. Analysis of each leads me to conclude that deposit insurance, which allows banks to hold insufficient capital, is the only public-policy-justifiable rationale for regulation. This concern can be managed with capital requirements; otherwise, banks should only be regulated as are other corporations.     

The transformation of banking: Tying loan interest rates to borrowers' CDS spreads

We investigate how the introduction of market-based pricing, the practice of tying loan interest rates to credit default swaps, has affected bank financing. We find that market-based pricing is associated with lower interest rates, both at origination and during the life of the loan. Our results also indicate that banks simplify the covenant structure of market-based pricing loans, suggesting that the decline in the cost of bank debt is explained, at least in part, by a reduction in monitoring costs. Market-based pricing, therefore, besides reducing the cost of bank debt, may also have adverse consequences resulting from the decline in bank monitoring.