Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/189878 
Year of Publication: 
2018
Series/Report no.: 
Staff Report No. 837
Publisher: 
Federal Reserve Bank of New York, New York, NY
Abstract: 
In standard Walrasian macro-finance models, pecuniary externalities such as fire sales lead to overinvestment in illiquid assets or underprovision of liquidity. We investigate whether imperfect competition (Cournot) improves welfare through internalizing the externality and find that this is far from guaranteed. In a standard model of liquidity shocks, when liquidity is sufficiently scarce, Cournot competition leads to even less liquidity than the Walrasian equilibrium. In a standard model of productivity shocks, the Cournot equilibrium overcorrects for the fire-sale externality and holds less capital than socially efficient. Implications for welfare and regulation therefore depend highly on the nature of the shocks and the competitiveness of the industry considered.
Subjects: 
liquidity
fire sales
overinvestment
financial regulation
macroprudential regulation
JEL: 
D43
D62
E44
G18
G21
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size
444.61 kB





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.