A Model of Financial Fragility

Roger Lagunoff and Stacey Schreft

Game Theory and Information from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: This paper presents a dynamic, stochastic game-theoretic model of financial fragility. The model has two essential features. First, interrelated portfolios and payment commitments forge financial linkages among agents. Second, iid shocks to investment projects’ operations at a single date cause some projects to fail. Investors who experience losses from project failures reallocate their portfolios, thereby breaking some linkages. In the Pareto-efficient symmetric equilibrium studied, two related types of financial crises can occur in response. One occurs gradually as defaults spread, causing even more links to break. An economy is more fragile ex post the more severe this financial crisis. The other type of crisis occurs instantaneously when forward-looking investors preemptively shift their wealth into a safe asset in anticipation of the contagion affecting them in the future. An economy is more fragile ex ante the earlier all of its linkages break from such a crisis. The paper also considers whether fragility is worse for larger economies.

JEL-codes: C72 E44 G11 G20 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1998-03-10, Revised 1998-04-30
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-fmk, nep-gth, nep-ifn and nep-pke
Note: Type of Document - .pdf; prepared on IBM PC; to print on HP;
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (15)

Downloads: (external link)
https://econwpa.ub.uni-muenchen.de/econ-wp/game/papers/9803/9803001.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: A Model of Financial Fragility (2001)
Working Paper: A model of financial fragility (1998)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wpa:wuwpga:9803001

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Game Theory and Information from University Library of Munich, Germany
Bibliographic data for series maintained by EconWPA ( this e-mail address is bad, please contact ).