A slow-burning problem (if at all)

In the words of the great Yogi Berra, the shenanigans in global banking over the past two weeks are “like déjà vu all over again.” The failures of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank in the US and the forced merger of Credit Suisse with UBS have given rise to fears of another bank-induced shock to the global system along the lines of 2008. My own view, for what it is worth, is that we are not on the cusp of a similar shock. But this does not mean that we will escape unscathed and there are lots of questions surrounding the current state of the banking landscape which will continue to reverberate and which may yet have far-reaching implications.

Balance sheet issues

The good news is that systemically important banks are adequately capitalised, at least according to the requirements laid down in the Basel III legislation implemented in the wake of the GFC (see table below). But as with all past crises, the introduction of new regulations is a response to the last war.

The academic evidence makes it clear that bank runs occur when depositors’ demand for liquidity is greater than banks’ ability to supply it. In an important 1983 paper by Douglas Diamond and Philip Dybvig[1] (for which they collected a Nobel Prize in economics last year, along with Ben Bernanke for significantly improving “our understanding of the role of banks in the economy”) the authors highlight that maturity mismatch, when banks’ assets are long-term but their liabilities are short-term in nature, results in an inherent instability in the event that depositors want their money back. This was precisely the problem faced by SVB where 43% of its assets were in the form of held-to-maturity securities marked at book value (significantly above their market value). It suggests that regulators may have to look more closely at the maturity structure of bank balance sheets in future.

Rising rates are the biggest problem

The reasons why banks are once again front and centre of the market debate are complex. But in large part the issues can be traced back to the sharp global monetary tightening that we have seen over the past year. Central banks have raised rates in response to inflation without really having a good understanding of how the monetary transmission process works. Indeed, so far any declines in inflation are due only to the impact of big oil price spikes dropping out of the calculations – nothing to do with tighter monetary policy – and there are real concerns that a sharp tightening of monetary policy will throw the European and US economies into recession. The pace of tightening in the US is the fastest since the late-1970s with the Fed funds rate having risen by 475bps in 13 months (an average of 0.36bps per month). The last time policy was tightened so aggressively was in 1978-79 and the result was recession.

Although in theory rising interest rates are good news for a banking sector that borrows short and lends long, higher rates also have adverse consequences. Aside from the fact that US banks are sitting on a bond portfolio whose market value is worth considerably less than they paid for it, there are mounting concerns about banks’ portfolio of commercial property. The dual impact of an economic slowdown and higher rates take the edge off property prices, reducing the value of the collateral against which loans are secured. Banks will be less willing to lend in these circumstances, potentially triggering further weakness in the commercial market. The fact that this sits on the balance sheet of regional US banks, which account for 70% of all commercial property lending, further amplifies the risks posed by the asset position of the US banking sector.

An additional problem is that banks have suffered from deposit outflows over the past year (chart above). The reason is that deposit rates tend to rise more slowly than lending rates with the result that depositors have an incentive to seek higher yielding alternatives, which goes a long way towards explaining why there has been a big inflow into US money market funds in recent weeks. According to Refinitiv Lipper data, US money market funds received a net $59.3bn of inflows in the week to March 29 bringing the monthly total to $273.3bn versus bank deposit outflows of $187bn over the first half of March.

Implications

The conditions which triggered the Lehman’s crisis of 2008 are not present today. Central banks have adhered to the Bagehot doctrine of providing ample liquidity against good collateral (whether they have done so at a penalty rate is moot). Although markets were spooked by the Credit Suisse issue and market concerns about Deutsche Bank were prevalent a week ago, if there are problems in the global banking system, they are more likely to emerge in the US than Europe.

By fully guaranteeing SVB depositors, despite the fact that many of them had deposits in excess of the $250k limit, the US authorities have sent a signal that there is no need for a rush to the exit which ought to limit the prospect of further bank runs. But whilst the kind of explosive shock which resulted from the Lehman’s bust is unlikely, there is still the prospect of a more slow-burn problem.

In some ways, the recent problems are reminiscent of the Savings and Loan crisis of the late-1980s/early-1990s. S&Ls were subject to limits on the interest rates they could offer to depositors, which consequently led to a major outflow of deposits to money market funds. Deregulation in the early 1980s encouraged them make risky loans in a bid to generate attractive returns, which went sour as the Fed tightened policy. S&Ls were encouraged to act in this way by taxpayer-funded guarantees provided by the Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation which created an enormous moral hazard problem. Between 1986 and 1995 almost one-third of S&L institutions ceased to exist and although it was a slow burner, the demise of S&Ls was a contributory factor to the US recession of 1990-91.

This is not to say that history will necessarily repeat itself but it should act as a warning signal for central bankers who continue to believe that excess inflation is the main problem for them to worry about. Rapid monetary tightening will exacerbate weaknesses in the financial system and a prudent central banker might wish to hold fire on further rate hikes, especially given the magnitude of the tightening put in place over the last year.

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[1] Diamond D. and P.  Dybvig (1983) ‘Bank runs, deposit insurance, and liquidity’, Journal of Political Economy, 91 (3), pp401–419

Soddy's Law

The name Frederick Soddy may not mean much to many people. Historians of science might recall that he collaborated with Ernest Rutherford on radioactivity and that he won the Nobel Prize for chemistry in 1921 for his research on radioactive decay. In the world of economics he occupies at best a place on the fringes despite having written four major works on the subject between 1921 and 1936. I recently dipped into his 1934 book The Role of Money (available online here) and although the prose is a little dated and some of the ideas are very much of their time (not to mention flawed), it is nonetheless fascinating to sift through his work to discover that he uncovered a number of macroeconomic ideas long before the celebrated economists of recent years. It is also worthwhile looking again at his work to determine whether it offers any insights on today's policy issues.

A man of astounding economic prescience

Although Soddy was largely dismissed as a crank during his lifetime, many of his policy prescriptions were later adopted into the mainstream. He was, for example, a great critic of the gold standard and argued strongly that exchange rates be allowed to float; he also argued in favour of using the government budget balance as a tool of macroeconomic policy and called for the establishment of independent statistical agencies to compile economic data (particularly to measure the price level). In the event, the idea of using fiscal policy as a policy tool was one of the cornerstones of the post-1945 Keynesian revolution whilst the suspension of dollar convertibility into gold in the early 1970s ushered in the era of floating exchange rates which has prevailed ever since. Moreover the UK established a Central Statistical Office seven years after Soddy first mooted the idea in 1934.

Economics as science

Soddy’s approach was rooted in physics, viewing the economy as a machine which requires inputs to derive outputs. Whilst there is a lot wrong with this way of thinking it was not out of tune with the mainstream views adopted in the post-1945 era, the echoes of which still persist today. But it is appropriate in one sense: A system which relies on such inputs will soon grind to a halt unless there is an infinite supply of them. Accordingly, Soddy’s ideas have been adopted by the modern-day ecological school of economics which views the economy less as a machine and more as a biological system.

The original motivation for his thinking was the recognition that a fractional banking system requires perpetual growth in order that the debt acquired in the process of generating today’s consumption can be repaid. As a scientist, Soddy understood that an economy based on the consumption of finite resources cannot continue to grow indefinitely since this would violate the laws of thermodynamics which prevent machines creating energy out of nothing or recycling it forever – an idea he set out in his 1926 book Wealth, Virtual Wealth, and Debt. 

Soddy recognised the fact that private sector banks create money simply by creating deposits thus inherently increasing the leverage in the system – in his memorable phrase: “Money now is the NOTHING you get for SOMETHING before you can get ANYTHING”. He further recognised that this exacerbated the swings in the credit cycle since banks were prone to call in loans when borrowers were least able to repay whilst they were most willing to grant credit when times were good and therefore when credit was least needed. Accordingly, one of Soddy’s main proposals was that the creation of money be taken out of private hands and should instead be fully backed by government created money.

Father of the Chicago Plan

Although Soddy’s ideas were generally ignored in the UK they did find support in the US. In a review of Soddy’s 1926 work, the great American economist Frank Knight noted that “it is absurd and monstrous for society to pay the commercial banking system “interest” for multiplying several fold the quantity of medium of exchange when a public agency could do it at negligible cost” particularly where there are huge costs associated with the booms and busts of the credit cycle. Influential US economists led by Henry Simons and Irving Fisher went on to formulate the Chicago Plan which advocated wholesale reform of the banking sector, notably the separation of the monetary and credit functions of the banking system, “by requiring 100% backing of deposits by government-issued money, and by ensuring that the financing of new bank credit only took place through earnings that have been retained in the form of government-issued money, or through the borrowing of existing government-issued money from non-banks.”

Needless to say the Chicago Plan did not find favour in the 1930s. However in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis the idea of full-reserve (or narrow) banking did come back onto the agenda. Institutions such as the IMF have recently given serious thought to the idea, with an influential working paper in 2012 conducting quantitative analysis which concluded that “the Chicago Plan could significantly reduce business cycle volatility caused by rapid changes in banks’ attitudes towards credit risk, it would eliminate bank runs, and it would lead to an instantaneous and large reduction in the levels of both government and private debt.” The FT’s chief economics commentator, Martin Wolf, who sat on the UK’s Independent Commission on Banking, came to a similar conclusion (although he did not credit Soddy with the original insight).

Rethinking narrow banking

In recent years the debate has taken a step further with the advent of digital currencies. In theory the likes of Bitcoin represent a form of narrow banking given that its supply is fixed. However, to the extent that each Bitcoin unit is divisible into sub-units of 100,000,000 it is possible to imagine a world in which value can be destroyed by division, in which case we are no better off. But the concept of a central bank digital currency (CBDC) may be a different story. The Bank of England’s illustrative model for a Sterling CBDC utilises a two-tier intermediation model, whereby Payment Interface Providers (PIPs) would keep all CBDC reserves at the central bank. These PIPs may be pure payment intermediaries or may be commercial banks processing transactions but the key point is that these CBDC deposits would not be used for lending. Such a policy is not without risks (as I discussed in this post a year ago) and I retain some scepticism that a CBDC does many of the things that are claimed for it. Nonetheless, their introduction may take us a long way closer towards realising Soddy’s idea.

One of the reasons why economists remain sceptical of narrow banking is the conventional view that it will reduce banks’ lending activity which will in turn act as a brake on economic growth[1]. But a lot of modern macro theory increasingly calls this view into question. This paper published in September 2020 by Hugo Rodríguez Mendizábal makes the case that a “fully reserve-backed monetary system does not necessarily have to reduce the amount of liquidity produced by depository institutions.” Space considerations mean that we cannot do justice to the full implications of the case for narrow banking and it is clearly a topic for another time. Suffice to say that it is a very active research area these days.

Last word

For a man who was regarded as a crank operating at the margins of respectable economics, many of Frederick Soddy’s “crazy” ideas have subsequently found a surprising degree of mainstream acceptance. Almost a century after he sowed the seeds, the idea of a full reserve-backed banking system refuses to die and has now become a respectable topic of research. It is perhaps not surprising that many of his ideas have such modern day resonance since many of today’s global economic problems echo those of the 1920s and 1930s. Indeed, as he wrote in 1934: “There is a growing exasperation that an age so splendid and full of the noblest promise of generous life should be in such ill-informed and incompetent hands.”

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[1] Diamond, D. W., and P. H. Dybvig. 1983. ‘Bank Runs, Deposit Insurance, and Liquidity.’ Journal of Political Economy 91(3) pp401-19

City blues

It has been a source of huge frustration to the financial services industry that it was side-lined during the Brexit negotiations with ministers apparently fixated on securing a deal for the fishing industry. It is a sign of the madness which has infected policymaking over recent years that an industry which – to one decimal place – accounts for 0% of GDP and which employs around 12,000 people, was prioritised over one which accounts for almost 7% of GDP; employs almost 1.4 million people and generates an external surplus which offsets a large chunk of the deficit in merchandise trade. Since the start of 2021 the British financial services industry no longer has unfettered access to its client base in the EU. Whilst there are many who would wish to see the City taken down a peg or two, the industry is of such a scale that a threat to the business model does have potentially major economic implications.

Recent events raise three obvious questions: (i) why did the British government fail to protect an industry in which it enjoys a significant comparative advantage; (ii) how has the nature of trade in financial services changed and (iii) what is likely to happen in future?

Why were financial services excluded from the Brexit negotiations?

The government apparently believed the City was big enough to look after itself, being as it is one of the largest financial hubs in the world. It was believed that the breadth and depth of services on offer could not be replicated elsewhere in the EU and that it made sense for the UK to defend its interests in other areas. I have long thought that this view was criminally complacent. Immediately after the 2016 referendum banks started to make provisions to continue conducting business on the assumption that they would no longer have access to the single market. I did point out in 2017 that financial institutions were not waiting around for government to make a decision. If ministers had been listening to what bankers told them, they would have realised just how much contingency planning was going on and how prepared they were to move business out of London.

How has the nature of financial services trade changed?

Access to the EU single market for financial services is governed by passporting rights. This means that once a firm is authorised in one EU state it can trade freely in any other with minimal additional authorisation. Passporting is based on the single EU rulebook for financial services and is not available for firms based in countries outside of the EU and the EEA, which face significant regulatory barriers to EU market access. As it is now treated as a third country for EU trading purposes, UK-based firms must now rely on regulatory equivalence in order to access the wider market. This works on the principle that the EU considers UK laws as having the same intent and produce broadly the same outcomes as those of the EU. But whilst it does give the UK market access, the degree of coverage is more limited than passporting and it can be unilaterally withdrawn with just 30 days’ notice which is no basis for long-term planning.

Where do we go from here?

For all that the Brexit trade treaty was signed last December, negotiations on financial services are far from done. Both sides intend to agree a Memorandum of Understanding by March 2021 to establish a framework which preserves financial stability, market integrity and the protection of investors and consumers. The issue of how to deal with equivalence determination is also likely to come up.

None of this disguises the fact that in the early weeks of 2021, the UK finds itself skating on very thin ice. It has seen its access to the EU market significantly reduced. Worse still, the EU appears engaged in a form of “land grab” to onshore as much financial services business as possible in a bid to reduce dependence on London as it ultimately attempts to form its own capital market union. To the extent that Brexit was sold as a project to enhance the UK’s global interests, British politicians can hardly complain when the EU responds by looking out for its own interests. It is hard to avoid the view that the City has been hung out to dry, but the fault for this lies squarely with politicians who either did not understand or (worse) ignored the industry and did not look out for British interests during negotiations.

 

There has been a lot of chatter about the erosion of the City’s position since the start of the year. One of the more well-publicised items was the news that Amsterdam’s trading volume in stocks exceeded that of London in January (chart 1). On the one hand the direct impact of this is marginal. It will not cost many jobs because trading is largely done electronically. Nor will there be a significant loss of tax revenue due to the fact that this is a low margin business. But it is symbolic. London does not have an inalienable right to remain the EU’s financial market place and we do have to wonder whether companies planning to list in Europe will necessarily see London as the go-to place in future. According to research by the think-tank New Financial at the end of 2019, 75% of all non-EU bank assets in the EU were held in the UK. By end-2020 it estimates that this share fell to 65% and it is likely to fall further in future. In addition, other parts of the industry are loosening their ties to London with trading of European carbon futures also set to move to Amsterdam.

In a speech last week, BoE Governor Andrew Bailey bemoaned the current state of affairs. He noted that “the UK has granted equivalence to the EU in some areas, but the EU has not done likewise to the UK.” Bailey also noted that the EU is attempting to hold the UK to “a standard that the EU holds no other country to and would, I suspect, not agree to be held to itself.” He concluded that the UK cannot allow itself to be a rule taker in financial services given that the assets of the sector are ten times that of UK GDP. Bailey is no tub-thumping Brexiteer and the BoE has consistently warned of the risks to London’s financial position resulting from Brexit. It will give him no pleasure to point out that its worst fears have been realised.

There is no doubt that the current arrangement on financial services trade is detrimental to the City’s interests. New Financial notes that there are 39 different types of equivalence arrangement but reckons that the UK has so far been granted two compared to 23 in force between the US and EU (chart 2). Matters do not appear likely to improve anytime soon since the EU has no incentive to offer the UK a better deal without a compromise in other areas which would undermine the regulatory independence that many politicians were seeking. Chancellor Rishi Sunak recently suggested that the City could use this opportunity to generate a 1986-style Big Bang 2.0 but this is not a view shared by Andrew Bailey, who noted last week that the UK should not “create a low regulation, high risk, anything goes financial centre and system. We have an overwhelming body of evidence that such an approach is not in our own interests, let alone anyone else’s.”

Quite what happens next is unclear. London still has advantages in terms of its network of related services and is still home to the global insurance industry. It also has a head start in fintech and has made great strides in green finance which put it ahead of many continental financial centres. But although the UK possesses large and deep financial markets only half the City’s wholesale business is derived from UK customers, with 25% coming from the EU. I have been making the point for many years that since financial services are a global industry, the threats to London also emanate from New York and Asia. Although the City is not about to collapse, it is difficult to see how a business that depends on barrier-free trade will enjoy the same pre-eminence as before. There were many in the City who voted for Brexit in 2016. I warned them at the time to be careful what they wished for. Now they may be about to reap what they sowed.