The Political Scar of Epidemics
What will be the political legacy of the Coronavirus pandemic? We find that epidemic exposure in an individual’s “impressionable years” (ages 18 to 25...
Revenge of the experts: Will COVID-19 renew or diminish trust in science?
It is argued that COVID-19 will reverse the ongoing trend of challenging the value of science and the integrity of scientists. This column shows that...
COVID-19: A Double Whammy of Financial and Economic Sudden Stops for Emerging Economies
While it is too early to say how the disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic will ultimately affect emerging market economies (EMs), experience...
Revenge of the Experts: Will COVID-19 Renew or Diminish Public Trust in Science?
An effect of the COVID-19 pandemic, it is sometimes suggested, will be to reverse the secular trend toward questioning the value of scientific...
Survival of Firms during Economic Crisis
We estimate the survival time of nearly 7,000 firms in a dozen of high-income and middle-income countries in a scenario of extreme economic distress...
The need to issue long-dated gilts
The COVID-19 crisis presents a multi-faceted challenge to policymakers. A combination of declining commodity prices, the rise in unemployment, and...
Survival of firms in developing economies during economic crisis
With lockdown measures in place worldwide, cash-flow represents a significant concern for firms across multiple sectors. This chapter estimates the...
Volatility, dark trading and market quality: evidence from the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic-driven market volatility
We exploit the exogenous shock of the COVID-19 pandemic on financial markets and regulatory restrictions on dark trading to investigate how volatility...
The coronavirus crisis is no 2008
Many comparisons have been made between the coronavirus crisis and the global systemic crisis in 2008. This column argues that seen through the lens...
Artificial intelligence as a central banker
Artificial intelligence, such as the Bank of England Bot, is set to take over an increasing number of central bank functions. This column argues that...
Bayesian Solutions for the Factor Zoo: We Just Ran Two Quadrillion Models
We propose a novel, and simple, Bayesian estimation and model selection procedure for crosssectional asset pricing. Our approach, that allows for both...
Banks and government bonds: A love story
European banks have been criticised for holding too much domestic government debt during the recent euro area crisis, intensifying the doom loop...
Dollars or Pence? Choosing a framework for US-China trade
Given that China is a strategic and economic rival to the US, the Trump administration’s framework for US-China trade makes far more sense than one...
Systemic consequences of outsourcing to the cloud
Financial institutions are increasingly outsourcing information technology to the cloud, motivated by efficiency, security, and cost. This column...
Longterm decision making under the threat of earthquakes?
Under the threat of earthquakes, long-term policy makers need tools to optimally decide on the economic trajectories that will maximize the society...
The dissonance of the short and long term
The type of risk we most care about is long-term, what happens over years or decades, but we tend to manage that risk over short periods. This column...
