Fed Liftoff and Subprime Loan Interest Rates: Evidence from the Peer-to-Peer Lending Market
On December 16th of 2015, the Fed initiated “liftoff,” raising the federal funds rate range by 25 basis points and ending a 7-year regime of near-zero rates. We use a unique dataset of 640,000 loan-hour observations to measure the impact of liftoff on interest rates in the peer-to-peer lending segment of the subprime market. We find that the average interest rate dropped by 16.9-22.6 basis points. This holds for 14 and 28 day windows centered around liftoff, and is robust to the inclusion of a broad set of loan-level controls and fixed effects. We also find that the spread between high and low credit rating borrowers decreased by 16%; and reject a number of candidate explanations for these results, including a change in borrower composition, a collapse in demand, and a shift in risk appetite. Our findings are consistent with an investor-perceived reduction in default probabilities; and suggest that liftoff provided a strong, positive signal about the future solvency of subprime borrowers, reducing their borrowing cost, even as short term rates increased in other markets. (JEL D14, E43, E52, G21)
Area: Monetary Policy and Central Banking
Keywords: peer-to-peer lending, subprime consumer loans, Fed liftoff, monetary policy signaling, default channel, household debt
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