Financial Amplification Mechanisms and the Federal Reserve's Supply of Liquidity during the Crisis

This is a print on demand edition of a hard to find publication. The small decline in the value of mortgage-related assets relative to the large total losses assoc. with the financial crisis suggests the presence of financial amplification mechanisms (FAM), which allow relatively small shocks to propagate through the financial system. The Federal Reserve¿s (FR) early-stage liquidity programs worked to dampen the balance sheet FAM arising from the positive feedback between financial...
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This is a print on demand edition of a hard to find publication. The small decline in the value of mortgage-related assets relative to the large total losses assoc. with the financial crisis suggests the presence of financial amplification mechanisms (FAM), which allow relatively small shocks to propagate through the financial system. The Federal Reserve¿s (FR) early-stage liquidity programs worked to dampen the balance sheet FAM arising from the positive feedback between financial constraints and asset prices. The FR¿s later-stage crisis programs takes into account adverse-selection FAM that operate via increases in credit risk and the externality imposed by risky borrowers on safe ones. New evidence suggests that increases in the FR¿s liquidity supply reduce interest rates during periods of high liquidity risk. Illus.