Claudio Bassi, Markus Behn, Michael Grill, Martin Waibel
This paper investigates both the magnitude and the drivers of bank window dressing behaviour in euro-denominated repo markets. Using a confidential transaction-level data set, our analysis illustrates that banks engineer an economically sizeable contraction in their repo transactions around regulatory reporting dates. We establish a causal link between these reductions and banks’ incentives to window dress and document the role of the leverage ratio and the G-SIB framework as the most relevant drivers of window dressing behaviour. Our findings suggest that regulatory action is warranted to limit banks’ ability to window dress.
The full paper is available at https://www.ecb.europa.eu//pub/pdf/scpwps/ecb.wp2771~fc55bab0d6.en.pdf