IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/moneco/v56y2009i5p617-634.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The alchemy of CDO credit ratings

Author

Listed:
  • Benmelech, Efraim
  • Dlugosz, Jennifer

Abstract

Collateralized loan obligations (CLOs) were one of the largest and fastest growing segments of the structured finance market, fueling the 2003-2007 boom in syndicated loans and leveraged buyouts. The credit crisis brought CLO issuance to a halt, and as a result the leveraged loan market dried up. Similar to other structured finance products, investors in CLOs rely heavily on credit rating provided by the rating agencies, yet little is known about CLO rating practices. This paper attempts to fill the gap. Using novel hand-collected data on 3912 tranches of collateralized loan obligations we document the rating practices of CLOs and analyze their structures.

Suggested Citation

  • Benmelech, Efraim & Dlugosz, Jennifer, 2009. "The alchemy of CDO credit ratings," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(5), pages 617-634, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:moneco:v:56:y:2009:i:5:p:617-634
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304-3932(09)00057-9
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Joshua Coval & Jakub Jurek & Erik Stafford, 2009. "The Economics of Structured Finance," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 23(1), pages 3-25, Winter.
    2. Myers, Stewart C. & Majluf, Nicholas S., 1984. "Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 13(2), pages 187-221, June.
    3. Steven N. Kaplan & Per Stromberg, 2009. "Leveraged Buyouts and Private Equity," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 23(1), pages 121-146, Winter.
    4. Joshua D. Coval & Jakub W. Jurek & Erik Stafford, 2009. "Economic Catastrophe Bonds," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(3), pages 628-666, June.
    5. Isabelle Huault & V. Perret & S. Charreire-Petit, 2007. "Management," Post-Print halshs-00337676, HAL.
    6. Peter DeMarzo & Darrell Duffie, 1999. "A Liquidity-Based Model of Security Design," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 67(1), pages 65-100, January.
    7. Stewart C. Myers & Nicholas S. Majluf, 1984. "Corporate Financing and Investment Decisions When Firms Have InformationThat Investors Do Not Have," NBER Working Papers 1396, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Peter M. DeMarzo, 2005. "The Pooling and Tranching of Securities: A Model of Informed Intermediation," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 18(1), pages 1-35.
    9. Barberis, Nicholas & Shleifer, Andrei, 2003. "Style investing," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(2), pages 161-199, May.
    10. Ashcraft, Adam B. & Schuermann, Til, 2008. "Understanding the Securitization of Subprime Mortgage Credit," Foundations and Trends(R) in Finance, now publishers, vol. 2(3), pages 191-309, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Hartman-Glaser, Barney & Piskorski, Tomasz & Tchistyi, Alexei, 2012. "Optimal securitization with moral hazard," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 104(1), pages 186-202.
    2. An, Xudong & Deng, Yongheng & Gabriel, Stuart A., 2011. "Asymmetric information, adverse selection, and the pricing of CMBS," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 100(2), pages 304-325, May.
    3. Efraim Benmelech & Jennifer Dlugosz, 2010. "The Credit Rating Crisis," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2009, Volume 24, pages 161-207, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. W. Scott Frame & Lawrence J. White, 2009. "Technological change, financial innovation, and diffusion in banking," FRB Atlanta Working Paper 2009-10, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
    5. Hanson, Samuel G. & Sunderam, Adi, 2013. "Are there too many safe securities? Securitization and the incentives for information production," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(3), pages 565-584.
    6. V.V. Chari & Ali Shourideh & Ariel Zetlin-Jones, 2010. "Adverse Selection, Reputation and Sudden Collapses in Secondary Loan Markets," NBER Working Papers 16080, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Calem, Paul & Henderson, Christopher & Liles, Jonathan, 2011. ""Cherry picking" in subprime mortgage securitizations: Which subprime mortgage loans were sold by depository institutions prior to the crisis of 2007?," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 120-140, June.
    8. Pagès, Henri, 2013. "Bank monitoring incentives and optimal ABS," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 30-54.
    9. Vink, Dennis, 2007. "An Empirical Analysis of Asset-Backed Securitization," MPRA Paper 10382, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 25 Aug 2008.
    10. Marques, Manuel O. & Pinto, João M., 2020. "A comparative analysis of ex ante credit spreads: Structured finance versus straight debt finance," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    11. Farhi, Emmanuel & Tirole, Jean, 2015. "Liquid bundles," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 158(PB), pages 634-655.
    12. Bianchi, Milo & Jehiel, Philippe, 2020. "Bundlers' dilemmas in financial markets with sampling investors," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 15(2), May.
    13. Andres Almazan & Alfredo Martín-Oliver & Jesús Saurina, 2015. "Securitization and Banks’ Capital Structure," The Review of Corporate Finance Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 4(2), pages 206-238.
    14. Mike Burkart & Samuel Lee, 2016. "Smart Buyers," Review of Corporate Finance Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 5(2), pages 239-270.
    15. Gann, Philipp, 2008. "Der Internal Capital Adequacy Assessment Process als regulatorischer Treiber eines aktiven Kreditportfoliomanagements," Discussion Papers in Business Administration 4831, University of Munich, Munich School of Management.
    16. Dahiya, Sandeep & Klapper, Leora & Parthasarathy, Harini & Singer, Dorothe, 2013. "The role of private equity investments in public firms : international evidence," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6484, The World Bank.
    17. Alex Edmans & William Mann, 2019. "Financing Through Asset Sales," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(7), pages 3043-3060, July.
    18. Kuong, John Chi-Fong & Zeng, Jing, 2021. "Securitization and optimal foreclosure," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 48(C).
    19. Arnoud W.A. Boot & Matej Marinč, 2012. "Financial Innovations, Marketability and Stability in Banking," Chapters, in: James R. Barth & Chen Lin & Clas Wihlborg (ed.), Research Handbook on International Banking and Governance, chapter 22, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    20. Merton, Robert C. & Thakor, Richard T., 2019. "Customers and investors: A framework for understanding the evolution of financial institutions," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 4-18.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Collateralized loan obligations Credit rating Leveraged buyouts securitization;

    JEL classification:

    • G01 - Financial Economics - - General - - - Financial Crises
    • G24 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Investment Banking; Venture Capital; Brokerage
    • G28 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Government Policy and Regulation

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:moneco:v:56:y:2009:i:5:p:617-634. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/505566 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.