Masking Risk

At the end of each of the past five quarters, large banks reduced their net short-term borrowings in the repo market, lowering risk profiles they release to the public, before boosting their borrowings in the middle of each successive quarter. The highlighted bars indicate the end of each quarter. Click on the tabs to see the net borrowing of securities such as U.S. Treasurys or corporate bonds as pledged as collateral on the repo market. (Dollar figures are in billions.)


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