Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Procurement: Contract Notice: ECB – Provision of Childcare Mediation Services (2013/S 086-144675).
Issue date: 03/05/2013.
Closing date: 14/06/2013.
Go to Source

(JEL: E58, G32) After the Lehman default, but also during the euro area sovereign debt crisis, central banks have tended to extend the ability of banks to take recourse to central bank credit operations through changes of the collateral framework (e.g. CGFS, 2008 – in consistence with previous narratives, such as Bagehot, 1873). We provide a simple four sector model of the economy in which we illustrate the relevant trade-offs, derive optimal central bank collateral policies, and show why in a financial crisis, in which liquidity shocks become more erratic and the total costs of defaults increase, central banks may want to allow for greater potential recourse of banks to central bank credit. The model also illustrates that the credit riskiness of counterparties and issuers is endogenous to the central bank’s credit policies and related risk control framework. Finally, the model allows identifying the circumstances under which the counterintuitive case arises in which a relaxation of the central bank collateral policy may reduce its expected losses.
Go to Source

(JEL: E6) This paper uses Eurobarometer survey data from 26 EU countries to evaluate whether the general public cares about financial stability and imbalances over and above their effects on key macroeconomic variables such as unemployment and inflation. I confirm previous results in the literature that life satisfaction – a widely used measure of household welfare – negatively depends on the unemployment rate. In addition to previous results in the literature, I establish a strong empirical link between life satisfaction and consumer confidence as measured by the European Commission consumer survey. The main result of the paper is that life satisfaction generally does not systematically depend on a number of measures of financial imbalance based on credit and asset prices once the other macroeconomic controls are included.
Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

(JEL: E52, E51, E61, E63, E65) In this paper we construct Financial Conditions Indices (FCIs) for the euro area, for the period 2003 to 2011, using a wide range of prices, quantities, spreads and survey data, grounded in the theoretical literature. One FCI includes monetary policy variables, while two versions without monetary policy are also constructed, enabling us to study the impact of monetary policy on financial conditions. The FCIs constructed fit in well with a narrative of financial conditions since the creation of the monetary union. FCIs for individual euro area countries are also provided, with a view to comparing financial conditions in core and periphery countries. There is evidence of significant divergence both before and during the crisis, which becomes less pronounced when monetary policy variables are included in the FCI. However, the impact of monetary policy on financial conditions appears not to be entirely symmetric across the euro area.
Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Procurement: Bekanntmachung: EZB-Ausschreibung 155-Facility-Management-Dienstleistungen-Los 5a Entsorgung (2013/S 083-138537).
Issue date: 29/04/2013.
Closing date: 31/05/2013.
Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Procurement: Bekanntmachung: EZB – Ausschreibung 155 – Facility-Management-Dienstleistungen – Los 5a Entsorgung (2013/S 083-138537).
Issue date: 29/04/2013.
Closing date: 29/04/2013.
Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

(JEL: C22, C53) We propose methods to evaluate the risk assessments collected as part of the ECB Survey of Professional Forecasters (SPF). Our approach focuses on direction-of-change predictions as well as the prediction of relatively more extreme macroeconomic outcomes located in the upper and lower regions of the predictive densities. For inflation and GDP growth, we find such surveyed densities are informative about future direction of change. Regarding more extreme high and low outcome events, the surveys are really only informative about GDP growth outcomes and at short-horizons. The upper and lower regions of the predictive densities for inflation are much less informative.
Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

(JEL: G21; G32) Using US bank holding company data for the period 2001 to 2007, this paper examines the relationship between banks’ retained interests in securitisations and insolvency risk. We find that the provision of credit enhancements and guarantees significantly increases bank insolvency risk, albeit this varies for different levels of securitisation outstanding. Specifically, retained interests increase insolvency risk for “large-scale” securitisers while having a risk-reducing effect for “small-scale” and/or first-time securitisers. In addition, we find that the type of facility provided has implications for bank risk, with those with the most subordinated (first-loss) position having the greater impact on banks’ default risk. Finally, we find that engagement in third-party securitisations has no significant effect on bank risk.
Go to Source

(JEL: G21 L80 L00) Banks supply payment services that underpin the smooth operation of the economy. To ensure an efficient payment system, it is important to maintain competition among payment service providers but data available to gauge the degree of competition are quite limited. We propose and implement a frontierbased method to assess relative competition in bank-provided payment services. Billion dollar banks account for around ninety percent of assets in the US and those with around to billion in assets turn out to be both the most and the least competitive in payment services, not the very largest banks.
Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source