MARTIN KUNCL

We study third-party loan guarantees in a model in which lenders can screen and sell loans before maturity when in need of liquidity. Loan guarantees improve market liquidity, reduce lending standards, and can have a positive overall welfare effect. Guarantees improve the average quality of \textit{non-guaranteed} loans traded and thus the market liquidity of these loans due to selection. This positive pecuniary externality provides a rationale for guarantee subsidies. Our results contribute to a debate about reforming government-sponsored mortgage guarantees by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, suggesting that the excessively high subsidies to these guarantees should be reduced but not completely eliminated... Bail-in bonds have gained a lot of attention among bank regulators. These bonds supposedly raise the hurdle for a government bailout by converting into loss-absorbing capital once the issuing bank runs into trouble. We argue that banks can short-circuit bail-in requirements by..