This paper investigates to what extent yield spreads on bonds issued by sub-sovereign entities within federations are driven by bailout expectations and investors' risk appetite, as opposed to fundamental values related to default risk. The question is analysed both across and within federations...

This paper studies the response of credit rating agencies to an increase in uncertainty about a government's fiscal position. To that end, a measure of the uncertainty around official forecasts of the public budget deficit is constructed that is comparable across time and a range of advanced...

The Bank recently commissioned a survey asking people about their unsecured borrowing and whether it is a burden to them. This article summarises the main results. As of October, 34% of respondents had some form of unsecured debt, over and above that which they expected to pay off at the end of...