The US Dollar Shortage in Global Banking

Abstract

Understanding the global financial crisis and the stresses on bank balance sheets requires a perspective on banks’ international investment positions and how these positions were funded across currencies and counterparties. This special feature uses the BIS international banking statistics to identify the cross-currency and counterparty funding patterns for the largest banking systems, and to assess the causes of the US dollar shortage during the critical phases of the crisis.

JEL Classification: F34, G01, G21