US dollar funding markets during the Covid-19 crisis - the international dimension

BIS Bulletin  |  No 15  | 
12 May 2020

Key takeaways

  • Dislocations in domestic US dollar money markets reverberated globally. Non-US banks lost a substantial part of funding from money market funds and had to borrow at shorter maturities.
  • Nevertheless, the severity of dollar funding strains varied substantially across banks, and eased for banks from jurisdictions with standing swap lines with the Federal Reserve.
  • The impact of policy measures to quell the stress was felt unevenly across different funding markets. The divergence between key rates resulted in an unusual divergence of funding cost metrics, with some indicating a "dollar glut" while others a "dollar shortage".