Permanent Data Collection Needed In Securities Financing: OFR

High quality data encompassing repo and securities lending activities are needed for regulators and policy makers to understand and monitor market developments, and hence permanent data collection exercise is needed to fully address data gaps, according to the Office of Financial Research. OFR points out in its working paper titled “Reference Guide to U.S. Repo and Securities Lending Markets” that even though daily volumes in the repo market have dropped since the crisis, they still dwarf the amount transacted in unsecured cash markets.

Need for permanent data collection – Total repo activity is around $5 trillion

Viktoria Baklanova and Rebecca McCaughrin of OFR and Adam Copeland of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York presented the institutional structure and described the...