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A New Heuristic Measure of Fragility and Tail Risks: Application to Stress Testing

Author

Listed:
  • Mr. Christian Schmieder
  • Mr. Tidiane Kinda
  • Mr. Nassim N. Taleb
  • Ms. Elena Loukoianova
  • Mr. Elie Canetti

Abstract

This paper presents a simple heuristic measure of tail risk, which is applied to individual bank stress tests and to public debt. Stress testing can be seen as a first order test of the level of potential negative outcomes in response to tail shocks. However, the results of stress testing can be misleading in the presence of model error and the uncertainty attending parameters and their estimation. The heuristic can be seen as a second order stress test to detect nonlinearities in the tails that can lead to fragility, i.e., provide additional information on the robustness of stress tests. It also shows how the measure can be used to assess the robustness of public debt forecasts, an important issue in many countries. The heuristic measure outlined here can be used in a variety of situations to ascertain an ordinal ranking of fragility to tail risks.

Suggested Citation

  • Mr. Christian Schmieder & Mr. Tidiane Kinda & Mr. Nassim N. Taleb & Ms. Elena Loukoianova & Mr. Elie Canetti, 2012. "A New Heuristic Measure of Fragility and Tail Risks: Application to Stress Testing," IMF Working Papers 2012/216, International Monetary Fund.
  • Handle: RePEc:imf:imfwpa:2012/216
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Borio, Claudio & Drehmann, Mathias & Tsatsaronis, Kostas, 2014. "Stress-testing macro stress testing: Does it live up to expectations?," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 12(C), pages 3-15.
    2. Mr. Christian Schmieder & Maher Hasan & Mr. Claus Puhr, 2011. "Next Generation Balance Sheet Stress Testing," IMF Working Papers 2011/083, International Monetary Fund.
    3. Nathalie Girouard & Christophe André, 2005. "Measuring Cyclically-adjusted Budget Balances for OECD Countries," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 434, OECD Publishing.
    4. Bayoumi, Tamim & Vitek, Francis, 2011. "Spillovers from the Euro Area Sovereign Debt Crisis: A Macroeconometric Model Based Analysis," CEPR Discussion Papers 8497, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. Mr. Claus Puhr & Mr. Andre O Santos & Mr. Christian Schmieder & Salih N. Neftci & Mr. Benjamin Neudorfer & Mr. Stefan W. Schmitz & Mr. Heiko Hesse, 2012. "Next Generation System-Wide Liquidity Stress Testing," IMF Working Papers 2012/003, International Monetary Fund.
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. N. N. Taleb & R. Douady, 2013. "Mathematical definition, mapping, and detection of (anti)fragility," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(11), pages 1677-1689, November.
    2. Robert Heath, 2013. "Why Are The G-20 Data Gaps Initiative And The Sdds Plus Relevant For Financial Stability Analysis?," Journal of International Commerce, Economics and Policy (JICEP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 4(03), pages 1-24.
    3. Mr. Daniel C Hardy & Mr. Christian Schmieder, 2013. "Rules of Thumb for Bank Solvency Stress Testing," IMF Working Papers 2013/232, International Monetary Fund.
    4. J. D. Opdyke, 2014. "Estimating Operational Risk Capital with Greater Accuracy, Precision, and Robustness," Papers 1406.0389, arXiv.org, revised Nov 2014.
    5. Paolo Giordani & Simon H. Kwan, 2019. "Tracking Financial Fragility," Working Paper Series 2019-6, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.
    6. Setene, Letlama & Jordaan, Daniel du P.S., 2021. "The trade-off between chain performance and fragility considering coordination strategies of agri-food chains: a South African egg chain's case study," International Food and Agribusiness Management Review, International Food and Agribusiness Management Association, vol. 24(3), March.
    7. Donald P. Morgan & Stavros Peristiani & Vanessa Savino, 2014. "The Information Value of the Stress Test," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 46(7), pages 1479-1500, October.
    8. Mr. Robert M Heath, 2013. "Why are the G-20 Data Gaps Initiative and the SDDS Plus Relevant for Financial Stability Analysis?," IMF Working Papers 2013/006, International Monetary Fund.
    9. Lemus, Antonio & Nuñez, Marco, 2020. "Pruebas de tensión bancaria: experiencia en los principales mercados financieros del mundo y en Chile [Bank stress tests: evidence from the main financial markets and Chile]," MPRA Paper 99097, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Piffaretti, Nadia F., 2014. "Elements for a Conceptual Model of Fragility," MPRA Paper 77861, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Mr. Eugenio M Cerutti & Mr. Christian Schmieder, 2012. "The Need for "Un-consolidating" Consolidated Banks' Stress Tests," IMF Working Papers 2012/288, International Monetary Fund.
    12. Harald de Bruijn & Andreas Größler & Nuno Videira, 2020. "Antifragility as a design criterion for modelling dynamic systems," Systems Research and Behavioral Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(1), pages 23-37, January.
    13. Atif Ansar & Bent Flyvbjerg & Alexander Budzier & Daniel Lunn, 2016. "Big is Fragile: An Attempt at Theorizing Scale," Papers 1603.01416, arXiv.org, revised Jun 2017.
    14. Callegari, C. & Szklo, A. & Schaeffer, R., 2018. "Cost overruns and delays in energy megaprojects: How big is big enough?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 211-220.
    15. Andrzej Slawinski, 2015. "Shielding money creation from severe banking crises: How useful are proposals offered by the alternative reform plans?," Bank i Kredyt, Narodowy Bank Polski, vol. 46(3), pages 191-206.
    16. Giuseppe Montesi & Giovanni Papiro, 2018. "Bank Stress Testing: A Stochastic Simulation Framework to Assess Banks’ Financial Fragility †," Risks, MDPI, vol. 6(3), pages 1-54, August.
    17. Thomas Santoli & Christoph Siebenbrunner, 2018. "An ontological investigation of unimaginable events," Papers 1803.02570, arXiv.org, revised Jun 2018.
    18. Mr. Heiko Hesse & Mr. Ferhan Salman & Mr. Christian Schmieder, 2014. "How to Capture Macro-Financial Spillover Effects in Stress Tests?," IMF Working Papers 2014/103, International Monetary Fund.

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