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Customer Liquidity Provision : Implications for Corporate Bond Transaction Costs

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Abstract

The convention in calculating trading costs in corporate bond markets is to assume that dealers provide liquidity to non-dealers (customers) and calculate average bid-ask spreads that customers pay dealers. We show that customers often provide liquidity in corporate bond markets, and thus, average bid-ask spreads underestimate trading costs that customers demanding liquidity pay. Compared with periods before the 2008 financial crisis, substantial amounts of liquidity provision have moved from the dealer sector to the non-dealer sector, consistent with decreased dealer risk capacity. Among trades where customers are demanding liquidity, we find that these trades pay 35 to 50 percent higher spreads than before the crisis. Our results indicate that liquidity decreased in corporate bond markets and can help explain why despite the decrease in dealers' risk capacity, average bid-ask spread estimates remain low.

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  • Jaewon Choi & Yesol Huh, 2017. "Customer Liquidity Provision : Implications for Corporate Bond Transaction Costs," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2017-116, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2017-116
    DOI: 10.17016/FEDS.2017.116
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    1. The Costs of Inefficient Regulation: The Volcker Rule
      by Kim Schoenholtz in Money, Banking and Financial Markets on 2019-09-23 12:54:49

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    5. Gündüz, Yalin & Ottonello, Giorgio & Pelizzon, Loriana & Schneider, Michael & Subrahmanyam, Marti G., 2018. "Lighting up the dark: Liquidity in the German corporate bond market," SAFE Working Paper Series 230, Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE.
    6. Bicu-Lieb, Andreea & Chen, Louisa & Elliott, David, 2020. "The leverage ratio and liquidity in the gilt and gilt repo markets," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 48(C).
    7. Jonathan Goldberg & Yoshio Nozawa, 2021. "Liquidity Supply in the Corporate Bond Market," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 76(2), pages 755-796, April.
    8. Goldstein, Michael A. & Hotchkiss, Edith S., 2020. "Providing liquidity in an illiquid market: Dealer behavior in US corporate bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(1), pages 16-40.
    9. Nathan Foley-Fisher & Stefan Gissler & Stephane Verani, 2019. "Over-the-Counter Market Liquidity and Securities Lending," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 33, pages 272-294, July.
    10. Antonio Falato & Diana A. Iercosan & Filip Zikes, 2019. "Banks as Regulated Traders," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2019-005r1, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.), revised 04 Aug 2021.
    11. DICKERSON, Alexander & NOZAWA, Yoshio & ROBOTTI, Cesare, 2025. "Factor Investing with Delays," Discussion Paper Series 771, Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University.
    12. Corey Garriott & Jesse Johal, 2018. "Customer Liquidity Provision in Canadian Bond Markets," Staff Analytical Notes 2018-12, Bank of Canada.
    13. Mattia Landoni & Stephen P Zeldes, 2025. "Should the Government Be Paying Investment Fees on $3 Trillion of Tax-Deferred Retirement Assets?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 38(4), pages 1014-1066.
    14. Robert Czech & Gábor Pintér, 2020. "Informed Trading and the Dynamics of Client-Dealer Connections in Corporate Bond Markets," Discussion Papers 2032, Centre for Macroeconomics (CFM).
    15. Jacobsen, Stacey & Venkataraman, Kumar, 2025. "Receiving investors in the block market for corporate bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 170(C).
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    17. Huh, Yesol & Infante, Sebastian, 2021. "Bond market intermediation and the Role of Repo," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    18. David Mallaburn & Matt Roberts-Sklar & Laura Silvestri, 2019. "Resilience of trading networks: evidence from the sterling corporate bond market," Bank of England working papers 813, Bank of England.
    19. Cohen, Assa & Kargar, Mahyar & Lester, Benjamin & Weill, Pierre-Olivier, 2024. "Inventory, market making, and liquidity in OTC markets," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 222(C).
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    JEL classification:

    • G10 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • G21 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Banks; Other Depository Institutions; Micro Finance Institutions; Mortgages
    • G28 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Government Policy and Regulation

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