Euro Area Bond Market Research Articles

Underpricing in the euro area bond market: New evidence from post-crisis regulation and quantitative easing

We conduct an extensive study of underpricing in the euro area bond market and find strong evidence of underpricing. In cross-sectional regressions we find patterns that are consistent with bookbuilding-based theories of underpricing and inconsistent with liquidity-based explanations. The underpricing has increased considerably during the financial crisis and has remained at an elevated level since. We also show that secondary market liquidity in the euro area bond market is significantly lower in the post-crisis period than pre-crisis. These results are consistent with recent US evidence and may represent unintended side effects of new regulation enacted in the wake of the financial crisis, such as Basel III and the Volcker Rule. Furthermore, our evidence suggests that the ECB’s corporate sector purchase programs has led to a decrease in underpricing.

Quantitative Easing and Preferred Habitat Investors in the Euro Area Bond Market

Quantitative easing (QE) aims to lower long term interest rates and stimulate economic growth via the portfolio rebalancing channel. One of the assumptions for QE to work is that there are investors with strong preferences to hold long term bonds, i.e. so called preferred habitat investors. This paper investigates whether the ECB’s Public Sector Purchase Programme (PSPP) affected euro area investors’ demand for bonds using granular securities holdings data. The results show strong evidence that euro area investors acted as preferred habitat investors. These findings hold across all major euro area investors (banks, insurance companies, pension funds and investment funds). The results suggest that since the sellers of bonds in response to QE in the euro area are different from those that sold to the Fed, BoE and BoJ, policymakers need to pay particular attention to demand by non-euro area investors, especially if the ECB plans to reduce its balance sheet.

A Tale of Fragmentation: Corporate Funding in the Euro-Area Bond Market

Corporations of different euro-area countries faced noticeably different costs of funding in the bond market during the prolonged period of financial instability that started in 2007. We identify the determinants of corporate bond yield spreads in order to isolate country-specific effects as indicators of market fragmentation. Our evidence hints at a disorderly process of reassessment of corporate credit risk since 2007, with country-specific spreads vis-a-vis Germany becoming strongly positive for issuers located in other euro-area countries (Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Spain, in particular). After the introduction of the non-conventional monetary policy tool named OMT, the spreads declined considerably, but fragmentation disappeared only in the most recent period characterized by expectations and the actual deployment of ECB quantitative easing.

A tale of fragmentation: Corporate funding in the euro-area bond market

Corporations of different euro-area countries faced noticeably different costs of funding in the bond market during the prolonged period of financial instability which started in 2007. We identify the determinants of corporate bond yield spreads in order to isolate country-specific effects, as indicators of market fragmentation. Our evidence hints at a disorderly process of reassessment of corporate credit risk since 2007 with country-specific spreads vis-à-vis Germany becoming strongly positive for issuers located in other euro-area countries (Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Spain, in particular). After the introduction of the non-conventional monetary policy tool named OMT, the spreads declined considerably, but fragmentation disappeared only in the latest period characterised by the expectations and the actual deployment of the ECB quantitative easing.

Was There a 'Greenspan Conundrum' in the Euro Area?

This paper implements an affine term structure model that accommodates unspanned macro risks for the Euro area, i.e. distinct from yield-curve risks. I use a Near-Cointegrated VAR-like approach to obtain a better estimation of the historical dynamics of the pricing factors, thus providing more accurate estimates of the term premium incorporated into the Eurozone's sovereign yield curve. I then look for notable episodes of the monetary cycle where long yields display a puzzling behavior vis-a-vis the short rate in contrast with the Expectation Hypothesis. The Euro-area bond market appears to have gone through its own Greenspan conundrum between January 1999 and August 2008. The term premium substantially contributed to these odd phenomena.

Inflation Risks and Inflation Risk Premia

This paper investigates the link between the perceived inflation risks in macroeconomic forecasts and the inflation risk premia embodied in financial instruments. We first provide some stylized facts about the term structure of inflation compensation, inflation expectations and inflation risk premia in the euro area bond market. Latent factor models like ours fit data well, but are often critisized for lacking economic interpretation. Using survey inflation risks, we show that perceived asymmetries in inflation risks help interpret the dynamics of long-term inflation risk premia, even after controlling for a large number of macro and financial factors. JEL Classification: G12, E31, E43

Flight-to-Quality or Flight-to-Liquidity? Evidence from the Euro-Area Bond Market

Flight-to-Quality or Flight-to-Liquidity? Evidence from the Euro-Area Bond Market

Which News Moves the Euro Area Bond Market?

Abstract This paper explores a long dataset (1999-2005) of intraday prices on German long-term bond futures and examines market responses to major macroeconomic announcements and ECB monetary policy releases. German bond markets tend to react more strongly to the surprise component in US macro releases compared with aggregated and national euro area and UK releases, and the strength of those reactions to US releases has increased over the period considered. We also document that the numbers of German unemployed workers consistently have been known to investors before official releases.

Flight-to-Quality or Flight-to-Liquidity? Evidence from the Euro-Area Bond Market

Do bond investors demand credit quality or liquidity? The answer is both, but at different times and for different reasons. Using data on the Euro-area government bond market, which features a unique negative correlation between credit quality and liquidity across countries, we show that the bulk of sovereign yield spreads is explained by differences in credit quality, though liquidity plays a nontrivial role, especially for low credit risk countries and during times of heightened market uncertainty. In contrast, the destination of large flows into the bond market is determined almost exclusively by liquidity. We conclude that credit quality matters for bond valuation but that, in times of market stress, investors chase liquidity, not credit quality.

Flight-to-Quality or Flight-to-Liquidity? Evidence from the Euro-Area Bond Market

Do bond investors demand credit quality or liquidity? The answer is both, but at different times and for different reasons. Using data on the Euro-area government bond market, which features a unique negative correlation between credit quality and liquidity across countries, we show that the bulk of sovereign yield spreads is explained by differences in credit quality, though liquidity plays a non-trivial role especially for low credit risk countries and during times of heightened market uncertainty. In contrast, the destination of large flows into the bond market is determined almost exclusively by liquidity. We conclude that credit quality matters for bond valuation but that, in times of market stress, investors chase liquidity, not credit quality.

Which News Moves the Euro Area Bond Market?

This paper explores a long dataset (1999-2005) of intraday prices on German long-term bond futures and examines market responses to major macroeconomic announcements and ECB monetary policy releases. In general, adjustments in prices are quick and new information is usually incorporated into prices within five minutes of announcements. The volatility adjustment is more long-lasting than that in the conditional mean, and excess volatility can be observed up to 30 minutes after the releases. Overall, German bond markets tend to react more strongly to the surprise component in US macro releases compared to euro area and domestic releases, and the strength of those reactions to US releases has increased over the period considered. The paper also provides evidence that the outcome of German unemployment figures has been known to investors ahead of the prescheduled release. JEL Classification: E43, E44, E58

Volatility spillovers and dynamic correlation in European bond markets

This paper examines the dynamic linkages among the European bond markets. We model the price and volatility spillovers from the US bond market and the aggregate Euro area bond market to twelve individual European bond markets using an EGARCH model that allows for a dynamic correlation structure. Our results suggest that significant volatility spillovers exist from both the aggregate Euro area bond market and the US bond market to the individual European markets. Moreover, the introduction of the Euro has strengthened the volatility spillover effects and the cross-correlations for most European bond markets.

The European Bond Markets under EMU

In this paper, we document how, in the wake of monetary unification, the markets for euro-area sovereign and private-sector bonds have become increasingly integrated. Issuers and investors alike have come to regard the euro-area bond market as a single one. Primary and secondary bond markets have become increasingly integrated on a pan-European scale. Issuance of corporate bonds has taken off on an unprecedented scale in continental Europe. In the process, both investors and issuers have reaped the considerable benefits afforded by greater competition in the underwriting of private bonds and auctioning of public ones, and by the greater liquidity of secondary markets. Bond yields have converged dramatically in the transition to EMU. The persistence of small and variable yield differentials for sovereign debt under EMU indicates that euro-area bonds are still not perfect substitutes. However, to a large extent, this does not reflect persistent market segmentation but rather small differentials in fundamental risk. Liquidity differences play at most a minor role, and this role appears to arise partly from their interaction with fundamental risk. The challenges still lying ahead are numerous. They include: the imbalance between the German-dominated futures and the underlying cash market; the vulnerability of the cash markets' prices to free-riding and manipulation by large financial institutions; the possibility of joint bond issuance by euro-area countries; the integration of clearing and settlement systems in the euro-area bond market; and the participation of new accession countries' issuers in this market. Copyright 2004, Oxford University Press.

Volatility Spillovers and Dynamic Correlation in European Bond Markets

This paper examines the volatility transmission mechanism from the US bond market and the aggregate Euro area bond market to twelve individual European bond markets. A bivariate EGARCH model with a dynamic conditional correlation structure that deals with US effects as exogenous is used. Our results suggest that significant volatility spillovers exist from both the aggregate Euro area bond market and the US bond market to the individual European markets. Moreover, the price and volatility spillovers have increased after the European Monetary Union for most European bond markets.