Does the debt market assess large banks, risk? : Time series evidence from money center CDs

Uninsured bank liabilities should offer a promised yield that compensates depositors for their expected default losses. However, the conjectural, guarantees available to large U.S. banking firms makes it questionable whether large depositors should or do feel themselves exposed to credit risk. Prior papers have evaluated the determinants of bank risk premia using cross-sectional data, with relatively inconclusive results. This paper investigates the same issue in a methodologically independent fashion: using time series data on specific banks' daily offering rates during the period May 1982 through July 1988. We find that CD rates paid by large money center banks include significant default risk premia.