Christoph Trebesch

Academic Year: 
2009-10
Direction: 
To Yale
Exchange Partners: 
Freie University
Research Interest: 
Resolution of Debt Crises

Financial crises can severely affect economic prosperity. In his research, Christoph analyses the resolution of financial crises, in particular, of sovereign debt crises. He is mainly interested in the role of creditor composition for crisis resolution and related debt negotiations between governments and foreign banks and bondholders. A key hypothesis is that creditor heterogeneity may result in longer debt renegotiations, thus delaying crisis resolution and, possibly trigger larger haircuts (creditor losses). Christoph also aims to understand whether crises involving a majority of US creditors differed from cases with mostly European creditors. The cornerstone of his econometric analysis will be a novel dataset on creditor characteristics in crisis situations. Ultimately, his project intends to contribute to the academic literature as well as the ongoing debate on a new international financial architecture.