We examine the role of institutional investors in monetary policy transmission to asset markets by exploiting a discontinuous threshold in the tax treatment of municipal bonds. As bonds approach the threshold, mutual funds, the primary institutional traders in the market, dispose of the bonds at...

We study how regulation limiting ESG policies distorts financial market outcomes. In 2021 Texas enacted laws that prohibit municipalities from contracting with banks with certain ESG policies, leading to the exit of five of the largest municipal bond underwriters from the state. Issuers...

We examine the role of institutional investors in monetary policy transmission to asset markets by exploiting a discontinuous threshold in the tax treatment of municipal bonds. As bonds approach the threshold, mutual funds, the primary institutional traders in the market, dispose of the bonds at...

This paper examines mean and volatility spillovers between four green municipal bonds issued by the US states of California, Colorado, Columbia and Ohio, and the role played by the recent Covid-19 pandemic and the COP policy announcements respectively. Specifically, four-variate VAR-GARCH-BEKK...

Using a sample of Chinese municipal corporate bonds from 2011 to 2019, this paper investigates the effect of city-level air pollution on local government financing costs. We find that cities with severe air pollution tend to have higher municipal corporate bond spreads, indicating that air...

We revisit the tax-loss selling hypothesis as an explanation of the January effect. We expand on prior empirical evidence from municipal bond closed-end funds (CEFs) by extending the sample period by 19 years and adding exchange-traded funds (ETFs). Our sample covers the introduction and rapid...

According to data released by the RF Ministry of Finance, against the backdrop of deteriorating economic dynamic, the consolidated debt of the subjects and municipalities of the Russian Federation amounted to Rb3.16 trillion, or 2.09% of GDP, as of January 1, 2023. Despite an increase by Rb...

We examine how coordination between elected officials and voters impacts local governments' borrowing costs. Using the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act as an identifying shock that implicitly raised the cost of local public goods for residents, we show in a difference-in-differences framework that the...

Natural resources are important assets in a region, and resource depletion may lead to the disappearance of local collateral, which may be priced by the capital market. This paper investigates the impact of resource depletion on the spread of municipal corporate bonds using data from the lists...

We show that dealer markups in the primary market for municipal bonds include risk premia that compensate dealers for bearing price risk. We also show that the markup per unit of risk tends to be higher for negotiated than competitive offerings, and that improvements in market transparency...

This paper examines mean and volatility spillovers between four green municipal bonds issued by the US states of California, Colorado, Columbia and Ohio, and the role played by the recent Covid-19 pandemic and the COP policy announcements respectively. Specifically, four-variate VAR-GARCH-BEKK...

We examine recent regulation requiring US municipal governments to disclose private debt. We show that governments fail to disclose 55-80% of reportable debt events and that, conditional on disclosure, filings often omit contract details essential for bond pricing. Non-compliant issuers are also...

We examine recent regulation requiring US municipal governments to disclose private debt. We show that governments fail to disclose 55-80% of reportable debt events and that, conditional on disclosure, filings often omit contract details essential for bond pricing. Non-compliant issuers are also...

This paper provides estimates of the supply elasticity of municipal debt and explores heterogeneity across different types of local governments by exploiting a discrete jump in interest rates created by the Tax Reform Act (TRA) of 1986. In order to qualify for bank financing of tax-exempt debt,...

At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, state and local governments were among the sectors expected to experience the most severe distress. The combination of a sharply deteriorating revenue picture, a pressing need for additional expenditures, delays in the receipt of substantial taxes owed, and...

Local governments often seek credit ratings from multiple agencies for external financing. Rating shopping and catering, the incentives of the rating agencies, and the career incentives of the analysts issuing the ratings may render the ratings interdependent. This paper estimates the feedback...

In March 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic caused severe financial stress for state and local municipalities. Municipalities' public health responses led to material increases in expenditures. At the same time, many municipalities faced revenue delays and declines due to extended tax deadlines and...

We examine how interstate differences in fiscal rules can help explain the differences in municipal bond returns across US states in a dynamic equilibrium model of municipal credit risk. State governments choose the optimal level of debt and a default policy, taking as given a fiscal rule for...

Saudi Arabia experience structural economic changes embodied by Vision 2030. One of the main aspects of this master plan is related to the financial markets and developing its instruments. This paper is devoted to developing new financial instrument called Municipality Sukuk (MuSk), and bring it...

In 2010, the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board (MSRB) proposed Rule Change SR-MSRB-2010-03 (the Rule Change), which requires a display of municipal bond credit ratings on the EMMA website, a centralized repository of municipal bond information. This Rule Change modestly improved retail...

Municipal bonds exhibit considerable retail pricing variation, even for same-size trades of the same bond on the same day, and even from the same dealer. Markups vary widely across dealers. Trading strongly clusters on eighth price increments, and clustered trades exhibit higher markups. Yields...

Calls for reforming the civil rights enforcement regime often focus on individual government officers. Recent years have brought demands to abolish qualified immunity—a defense that protects individual officers from liability so long as they did not violate clearly established law—and to end...

We hand-collect new data on municipal bonds issued by all states and the largest 100 cities in the U.S. between 1920 and 2020 and study how the terms of municipal bond financing evolved over the last century. We document a striking decline of almost 50% in the maturity of these bonds. We analyze...

Credit ratings are pivotal for municipal bonds as they determine borrowing cost for state and local level governments that are ultimately born by taxpayers. Prior to 2010 credit rating recalibration, municipal bonds were rated by major credit ratings agencies on a separate rating scale that...

This paper shows that state tax policy significantly affects the transmission of asset purchase programs into municipal bond prices. I establish theoretically and empirically two parameters that determine prices in the cross section: the tax rates of in-state investors and the aggregate wealth...

This paper shows that climate risk mitigation strategies are priced in financial markets. Using extreme weather and natural capital loss shocks, I demonstrate that the municipal bond market starts to price natural capital following an extreme weather event. The yield spread between counties that...

We investigate the association between a wide range of environmental and social outcomes and the credit risk of municipal finance fixed income securities. Building on recent work documenting the pricing of climate risk, future opioid health care costs and race-based investor preferences at the...

We analyze the impact of $38 billion of corporate subsidies given by U.S. local governments on their borrowing costs. We find that winning counties experience a 13.6 bps increase in bond yield spread as compared to the losing counties. The increase in yields is higher (16 -- 21 bps) when the...

Migration patterns in the United States changed dramatically during the COVID-19 pandemic. We find that COVID-induced migration predicts municipal bond yield spreads, particularly for lower-rated bonds and areas experiencing larger than usual population outflows. Analyzing this effect across the...

We examine recent regulation requiring US municipal governments to disclose private debt. We show that governments fail to disclose 55-80% of reportable debt events and that, conditional on disclosure, filings often omit contract details essential for bond pricing. Non-compliant issuers are also...

This paper reveals a non-monotonic impact of local mutual funds on municipal bond issuance. Offering yields are higher in states with open-end municipal bond funds, and with larger aggregate fund size. However, holding local fund size constant, yields are decreasing in the number of funds. Such...

This paper studies the cross-section of expected municipal bond returns. We show that municipal bond yields contain reliable information about differences in expected municipal bond returns across states of issuance, duration range, and credit quality. Hence, using information embedded in those...

This research paper presents and discusses the main results generated and obtained with the proprietary computer platform CIDIUS®, developed by the authors of this work, which aims to support the decision-making process of Portuguese mayors. Thus, keeping in mind the theoretical models and...

This paper explores which variables are more significant in municipal executive recommendation by citizens. We estimated the influence of public dimensions, such as municipe loyalty, municipe satisfaction, and municipe perceived value in municipal executive recommendation by citizens. Then, we...

Municipal (muni) bonds are an important source of funding for state and local governments. During the Covid-19 pandemic, muni debt markets became severely distressed. In response, the Federal Reserve established the Municipal Liquidity Facility (MLF). Meanwhile, Congress enacted extensive fiscal...

The economics literature lacks articles that provide a broad roadmap-let alone a logical explanation-of the new set of Federal Reserve policy tools that were created to counter the COVID-19 recession. This study provides an overview of the motivation for these new credit-easing programs-namely...

At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, state and local governments were among the sectors expected to experience the most severe distress. The combination of a sharply deteriorating revenue picture, a pressing need for additional expenditures, delays in the receipt of substantial taxes owed, and...

We estimate the option value of municipal liquidity by studying bond market activity and public sector hiring decisions when government budgets are severely distressed. Using a regression discontinuity (RD) design, we exploit lending eligibility population cutoffs introduced by the federal...

For over two centuries, the municipal bond market has been a source of systemic risk, which returned early in the COVID-19 downturn when borrowing from securities markets became costly for many private and public entities, and some found it difficult to borrow at all. Indeed, just before the Fed...