"Endogenous Political Turnover and Fluctuations in Sovereign Default Risk", by Satyajit Chatterjee and Burcu Eyigungor
1. Endogenous Political Turnover and Fluctuations in
Sovereign Default Risk
Satyajit Chatterjee and Burcu Eyigungor
FRB Philadelphia
Cambridge-INET Inst Conf
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 1 / 31
2. Focus
Foreign borrowing and conflict of interest between sovereigns and
citizens
Three emerging economies — Mexico, Peru and Turkey
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 2 / 31
3. Motivation
A vibrant quantitative-theoretic literature that builds on Eaton and
Gersovitz (1981)
Posits high discount rates to account for observed default risk (2-3
defaults per century)
Not uncommon to see annual discount rates close to 20 percent (com-
parable discount rates for AE DSGE models would be 4 percent or
less)
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 3 / 31
4. What We Do
EG framework augmented with politically induced short-termism
Conventional discount rate, but drop the benevolent dictator assump-
tion
Instead, sovereign is a public good provider with an agency cost; di-
verts a portion of public expenditures for private consumption
Conflict of interest: anticipated loss of power makes sovereign
myopic
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 4 / 31
5. What We Do
EG framework augmented with politically induced short-termism
Empirically, political turnover is linked to economic performance
Brender and Drazen (2008): For democratic EMEs, a 1 percentage
point increase in growth rate during term increases reelection probabil-
ity by 6-9 percentage points
Growth follows a 2-regime Markov-switching process as in Hamilton
(1989)
Link reelection prob positively to prob that regime is good
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 5 / 31
6. What We Get
Political short-termism microfounds high discount rates – exogenous
political turnover model ∼ benevolent dictator w/ high discount
rate
Endogenous political turnover implies growth-linked variations in the
effective discount factor – large fluctuations in sovereign default
risk
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 6 / 31
10. Government Stability and Spreads
ICRG Government Stability Index and EME Spreads
Country Corr(GSI, Spreads)
Argentina −0.53
Brazil −0.11
Ecuador 0.35
Malaysia −0.65
Mexico −0.12
Peru 0.01
Russia −0.33
Venezuela −0.28
Uruguay −0.72
Source: Scholl (2016, Table 1, pp. 28). All series are HP-filtered with
smoothing parameter of 100
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11. Literature
Politics and short-termism Alesina and Tabellini (1990), Persson
and Svensson (1989), Inman and Fitts (1990) . . .
Sov debt with politically-induced myopia: Cuadra and Sapriza
(2008), Scholl (2016), Amador (2012), Aguiar and Amador (2011),
Alfaro and Kanczuk (2016)
Sov debt with exogenously fluctuating myopia: Cole, Dow, and
English (1995), Hatchondo, Martinez, and Sapriza (2009), D’Erasmo
(2012)
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 11 / 31
13. Preferences
Politician, conditional on being in power
U([1 − τ]Kt ) + Ψ U(τKt )
Politician, when out of power
U([1 − τ]Kt )
Citizens (voters)
U([1 − τ]Kt )
U(C) = C1−γ
1−γ
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 13 / 31
15. Market Structure
Sovereign can borrow externally (only) with option to default
Debt is long-term: λBt is due & (1 − λ)Bt earns coupon z
Default option
Creditors get nothing in default
Default leads to exclusion and φYt is lost each period until re-entry
Re-entry occurs with probability (1 − ξ)
Market price of debt: q(Yt,gt,θt,Bt+1)
Ωt = {Yt,gt}
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 15 / 31
16. Timing
Inherit Bt & θt−1
Observe gt and update θt
With prob π election is called
If challenger wins, θt is reset to θ
Leader chooses default or Bt+1
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 16 / 31
17. Election Uncertainty
Pre-election value of citizens under access V (Ω,θ,B)
Incumbent wins if
V (·,θ,·) − V (·,θ,·) >
(a shock in favor of the challenger) ∼ Type 1 EV with var ∝ κ
η(Ω,θ,B) =
exp(V (·,θ,·)/κ)
exp(V (·,θ,·)/κ) + exp(V (·,θ,·)/κ)
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 17 / 31
23. Parameters Chosen Independently
Parm. Description Targets {PE,MX,TR)} Values {PE,MX,TR)}
Revenue Process
ρ Autocorrelation of growth rates { 0.43, 0.28, 0.19 } { 0.43, 0.28, 0.19 }
µG % Mean growth, G regime { 0.39, 0.16, 0.20 } { 0.39, 0.16, 0.20 }
µB % Mean growth, B regime { −0.59, −0.28, −0.17 } { −0.59, −0.28, −0.17 }
σG % S.D. of growth, G regime { 0.88, 0.67, 0.69 } { 0.88, 0.67, 0.69 }
σB % S.D. of growth, B regime { 3.80, 1.82, 3.19 } { 3.80, 1.82, 3.19 }
Preferences
β Discount Factor {0.9876,0.9876 ,0.9876 } {0.9876,0.9876,0.9876}
γ Utility Curvature 0.5 0.5
Default Cost
ξ Prob of Re-entry 1 year to settlement, on average 0.25
Bond Market
rf Risk-free Rate 0.01 0.01
λ Prob of maturity Avg. maturity in years {8.18,9.65,6.70} {0.031,0.026 ,0.037}
z Coupon rate 0.01 0.01
Politics
π Prob. of election Every 4 years, on average 1/16
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 23 / 31
24. Parameters Chosen Jointly
Parm. Description Targets {PE,MX,TR)} Values {PE,MX,TR)}
Revenue Process
αG Prob of G to B {0.07, 0.04, 0.10} {0.06, 0.04, 0.10 }
αB Prob of B to G {0.11, 0.07, 0.11} {0.06, 0.02, 0.08 }
Bond Market
φ Default Cost Avg. haircut × Avg. (b/y)
0.37× {1.5, 0.92, 0.91} {0.20, 0.11, 0.11}
Politics
ζ Diversion % Annualized avg. spreads {3.4, 3.4, 3.9} {0.38, 0.07, 0.12}
θ Prob. new gov’t is G Avg. incumbency of 8 years, equivalently,
avg. reelection probability of 0.5 {0.81, 0.87, 0.64}
κ Election uncertainty A reelection prob. increase of 6-9 ppts
for 1% rise in average g over term {0.24, 0.06, 0.05}
“Tremble”
¯m m ∼ U[− ¯m, ¯m] Convergence in < 104 iterations 10−2× {1, 2.5, 1.5}
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 24 / 31
31. Conclusion
An Alternative Approach to Sovereign Debt and Default
Sovereign as a public-good provider with agency costs
Agency costs imply short-termism in the face of political turnover
Short-termism is amplified in bad times (when turnover is more likely)
leading to volatility
Well-suited to aggregative analysis of EMEs
For the future: Connect to literature on political institutions and
agency costs
Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 31 / 31
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Chatterjee-Eyigungor Politics and Fluctuations Cambridge-INET Inst Conf 31 / 31