-
About the
New York Fed -
Economic
Research -
Financial Institution Supervision
- Financial Services
& Infrastructure- Outreach
& EducationThe New York Fed engages with individuals, households and businesses in the Second District and maintains an active dialogue in the region. The Bank gathers and shares regional economic intelligence to inform our community and policy makers, and promotes sound financial and economic decisions through community development and education programs.
Liberty Street Economics
7 posts from January 2014January 17, 2014
Historical Echoes: Maiden Lane, Where Now Such Waves of Commerce Flow
Mary Tao and Vernon Lovejoy
In the 1600s, a stream flowed near the land now occupied by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, running all the way to the East River. At that time, maidens followed a footpath to the stream’s banks to wash laundry in its fresh water, earning the path the name Maidens’ Path (or in Dutch—Maagde Paatje). When the English arrived in 1664, the name of the street changed to Maiden Lane. As New York City expanded beyond its downtown origins over the years, city planners covered over the stream—but the street’s name stuck.
Continue reading "Historical Echoes: Maiden Lane, Where Now Such Waves of Commerce Flow" »
January 16, 2014
Just Released: Introducing the Business Leaders Survey
Jason Bram and Richard Deitz
Today, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York begins releasing its monthly survey of regional business activity, called the Business Leaders Survey. This survey is a close cousin of our Empire State Manufacturing Survey, with some differences. The Business Leaders Survey covers the service sector rather than the manufacturing sector, and its respondents come from New York, northern New Jersey, and southwestern Connecticut, instead of just New York State. This new monthly release will provide another timely regional indicator to help gauge both local and national business cycles, and it will be available well before hard economic data on the region from other sources become available. In this post, we show that data from the survey, which have been collected monthly since 2004, provided some early signals about the most recent recession and recovery, at both the national and regional levels. The January 2014 survey points to continued modest growth in service-sector activity in the region, coupled with increasingly widespread optimism about future conditions.
Continue reading "Just Released: Introducing the Business Leaders Survey" »
January 15, 2014
Why Do Banks Feel Discount Window Stigma?
Olivier Armantier
Even when banks face acute liquidity shortages, they often appear reluctant to borrow at the New York Fed’s discount window (DW) out of concern that such borrowing may be interpreted as a sign of financial weakness. This phenomenon is often called “DW stigma.” In this post, we explore possible reasons why banks may feel such stigma.Continue reading "Why Do Banks Feel Discount Window Stigma?" »
January 13, 2014
Discount Window Stigma
Olivier Armantier
One of the main missions of central banks is to act as a lender of last resort to the banking system. In the United States, the Federal Reserve has relied on the discount window (DW) for nearly a century to fulfill this task. Historically, however, the DW has been little used even when banks may have faced acute liquidity shortages, a phenomenon commonly attributed to stigma. In this post, we show that during the last financial crisis banks were willing to pay large premia to avoid borrowing from the DW, suggesting that DW stigma is an economically important phenomenon.
January 10, 2014
Crisis Chronicles: The Mississippi Bubble of 1720 and the European Debt Crisis
James Narron and David Skeie
Convicted murderer and millionaire gambler John Law spotted an opportunity to leverage paper money and credit to finance trade. He first proposed the concept in Scotland in 1705, where it was rejected. But by 1716, Law had found a new audience for his ideas in France, where he proposed to the Duke of Orleans his plan to establish a state bank, at his own expense, that would issue paper money redeemable at face value in gold and silver. At the time, Law’s Banque Generale was one of only six such banks to have issued paper money, joining Sweden, England, Holland, Venice, and Genoa. Things didn’t turn out exactly as Law had hoped, and in this edition of Crisis Chronicles we meet the South Sea’s lesser-known cousin, the Mississippi Bubble.
Continue reading "Crisis Chronicles: The Mississippi Bubble of 1720 and the European Debt Crisis" »
January 08, 2014
Comparing Bank and Supervisory Stress Testing Projections
Beverly Hirtle and Anna Kovner
Stress tests are important tools for assessing whether financial institutions have enough capital to operate in bad economic conditions. In addition to being useful for understanding capital weaknesses at individual firms, coordinated stress tests can also provide insight into the vulnerabilities facing the banking industry as a whole. In this post, we look at 2013 stress test projections made by eighteen large U.S. bank holding companies under the requirements of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act and compare them with supervisory projections made by the Federal Reserve to see if the two sets of projections identify similar vulnerabilities and risks for the banking system.
Continue reading "Comparing Bank and Supervisory Stress Testing Projections" »
January 06, 2014
Are Economic Values Transmitted from Parents to Children?
Marco Cipriani, Paola Giuliano, and Olivier Jeanne
Economic research shows that differences in cultural traits and values—for example, trust, or the propensity to cooperate and not free-ride on others—are important determinants of economic outcomes, such as growth, economic and financial development, and international trade. It’s much less clear, however, where these differences in economic-relevant values come from. While economists generally assume that they’re transmitted from parents to children, the empirical evidence to this effect is almost nonexistent.
Continue reading "Are Economic Values Transmitted from Parents to Children?" »
About the BlogLiberty Street Economics features insight and analysis from New York Fed economists working at the intersection of research and policy. Launched in 2011, the blog takes its name from the Bank’s headquarters at 33 Liberty Street in Manhattan’s Financial District.
The editors are Michael Fleming, Andrew Haughwout, Thomas Klitgaard, and Asani Sarkar, all economists in the Bank’s Research Group.
Liberty Street Economics does not publish new posts during the blackout periods surrounding Federal Open Market Committee meetings.
The views expressed are those of the authors, and do not necessarily reflect the position of the New York Fed or the Federal Reserve System.
Economic Research Tracker
Liberty Street Economics is now available on the iPhone® and iPad® and can be customized by economic research topic or economist.
View by Topicbank capital balance of payments banks central bank corporate finance credit crisis crisis chronicles cryptocurrencies currency current account dealers demographics dodd-frank dsge economic history education employment euro area exchange rates expectations exports fed funds federal reserve financial institutions financial intermediation financial markets fire sale fiscal policy fomc forecasting foreclosure great recession hey, economist! high frequency trading historical echoes household household finance housing human capital inequality inflation international economics labor economics labor market lender of last resort liquidity macroecon monetary policy mortgages new jersey new york new york city pandemic panic phillips curve puerto rico recession regional analysis regulation repo sandy stocks student loans systemic risk tariffs treasury unemployment wagesMost Viewed1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
Last 12 MonthsUseful LinksComment GuidelinesWe encourage your comments and queries on our posts and will publish them (below the post) subject to the following guidelines:Please be brief: Comments are limited to 1500 characters.Please be quick: Comments submitted after COB on Friday will not be published until Monday morning.Please be aware: Comments submitted shortly before or during the FOMC blackout may not be published until after the blackout.Please be on-topic and patient: Comments are moderated and will not appear until they have been reviewed to ensure that they are substantive and clearly related to the topic of the post. We reserve the right not to post any comment, and will not post comments that are abusive, harassing, obscene, or commercial in nature. No notice will be given regarding whether a submission will or will not be posted.Disclosure PolicyThe LSE editors ask authors submitting a post to the blog to confirm that they have no conflicts of interest as defined by the American Economic Association in its Disclosure Policy. If an author has sources of financial support or other interests that could be perceived as influencing the research presented in the post, we disclose that fact in a statement prepared by the author and appended to the author information at the end of the post. If the author has no such interests to disclose, no statement is provided. Note, however, that we do indicate in all cases if a data vendor or other party has a right to review a post.Archives - Financial Services
RSS Feed