How market forces and weakened institutions are keeping our wages low

From The Conversation.

Within the political class there is a low level moral panic about low wages growth. The irony is that those lamenting this situation are simply witnessing the ultimate outcome of policies they have long advocated.

While Australia still has systems like Industrial Tribunals and Awards – given how they interact with market forces today, these institutions now work to entrench wage inequality rather than reduce it.

Wage rates and movements are determined by a combination of market and institutional forces. Technology, human capital, levels of labour supply and the profitability of companies in laggard and leading set the lower and upper bounds for sustainable wage levels.

As economist and philosopher Adam Smith noted, the income workers require to survive sets what’s called a “market floor” for wages – the lowest acceptable limit. Rates of profit in the best performing firms set the upper limit, as Australia’s executive class has shown very clearly for over three decades now. What rates actually prevail within these very broad limits are determined by institutional forces – in Australia, the award system of minimum wages and unions collective bargaining rights.

Historically Australia has had the great benefit of having institutional arrangements that balanced these forces well. The key elements of this were a network of industrial tribunals that regularly assessed the overall economic and social situation and determined what rates and movements in pay were sustainable.

These rates were not set unilaterally, but in coordination with what employers and organised workers indicated was possible, in industry level collective agreements.

The defacto rule was that wage movements should equate to movements in productivity plus the cost of living. The standards set in the leading profitable sectors then spread to the entire workforce through the maintenance of award relativities (ie standard comparative rates of pay set by reference to benchmark occupations like metal fitter, carpenter and truck driver). During this time awards rates approximated pretty closely to going rates of pay.

These underlying principles were not unique to Australia. In the era following the second world war it meant that in most countries workers shared in productivity growth and wages tracked pretty closely with it.

Since the mid 1970s and especially since the 1980s all this has changed.

Australia has not seen anything like full employment since the early 1970s. While unemployment has been cyclical, it has usually been 5% or more since that time. More importantly, underemployment has been on the rise.

This has not been cyclical. It has racketed up after each recession.

And that is just in terms of hours worked. If we took into account workers with skills not being used, levels of labour underutilisation are much higher. Estimates of underutilisation of this nature vary as being between 15 and 25%.

High levels of indebtedness also weaken workers bargaining power. Today few can hold out for long bargaining periods – either individually or collectively. This gives employers a huge advantage in setting wages.

The legacy of labour market ‘reform’

In the 1970s and 1980s Australia’s wage setting institutions worked well to protect wage rates against the full force of these downward pressures. Since the early 1990s, however, those institutions have been transformed.

The key issue here has not just been the weakening of unions and their bargaining power. Just as significant has been the uncoupling of wage rates set by wage leaders, from the wages of the weak. Workers in benchmark setting sectors like construction used to establish wage norms. These were recognised by industrial tribunals as a community standard which they then passed on to workers in weaker sectors like retail through generalised award wage base rises. In this way the wages of the strong supported movement in the wages of the weak.

This was a key “reform” of the Keating government, introduced with the active support of the ACTU. It was explicitly designed to let wages of the strong grow faster than the wages of the weak to maintain macroeconomic balance as the wages system decentralised.

The Howard governments’ labour law changes – first the Workplace Relations Act (1996) and then Workchoices (2006) – merely extended the logic of this reform trajectory. The current Fair Work Act merely codifies this trajectory as the law of the land today.

Today Austraila’s minimum wages remain among the highest in the world. The difference is they operate in relative isolation from the rest of the workforce.

Until the 1990s they were part of an interconnected system that ensured wages gains of the strong were widely shared. Today they provide the ultimate safety for those with the weakest levels of bargaining power – currently about 15% of the workforce directly and a further 15% indirectly.

We should also not forget the new found role of Treasury departments. Immediately after its election, the O’Farrell government in NSW legislated to cap wage rises in the NSW public sector to no more than 2.5% per annum.

Pubic sector teachers and nurses, especially in NSW, were emerging at the new wage leaders. This meant that their wages were now capped and this Treasury edict – and not collective bargaining and arbitration – set community wage norms.

Today our wages system has a different logic. The recent cut in penalty rates is a case of the wages of the weak putting pressure on the wages of the strong. While the Fair Work Commission quarantined the rest of the workforce from this cut by limiting its recent decision to low paid service workers – the precedent is there. Future movement in wage standards for anti-social hours will be down and not up.

Over the course of the twentieth century Australia devised a remarkable set of institutions to manage the complex problem of wages and labour standards. It’s time we built on what little remains of that legacy to remedy low wage growth.

Building on these institutions doesn’t mean restoring what was. New policies need to engage with new realities. Even former enthusiastic supporters for reducing labour standards and wages such as the IMF now recognise growth needs to be inclusive if it is to sustainable.

It’s much easier to destroy institutions that deliver fair pay than build them. Australia found ways of achieving fair pay over the course of the twentieth century – it can to so again.

Author: John Buchanan, Head of the Discipline of Business Analytics, University of Sydney Business School, University of Sydney

Customer Credit Data At Risk

The US arm of the credit score company Equifax –  the company who organises, assimilates and analyses data on more than 820 million consumers and more than 91 million businesses worldwide, and its database includes employee data contributed from more than 6,600 employers – has disclosed that one of it’s databases was breached through an unspecified vulnerability on its website, exposing the personal information of an estimated 143 million people, including some in the UK and Canada.

This highlights again the hidden risks in the online world, as such data is very valuable and could be used to create false identities or lead to phantom transactions.

Equifax Australia (ex. Veda), which itself holds the credit history information on Australian customers is a wholly owned subsidiary. The local company tweeted “please be assured that we have found no evidence that personal information of consumers in Australia or New Zealand has been impacted by the US cybersecurity incident”.

Equifax says the US penetration occurred sometime between mid-May and the end of July, but has only recently announced that the breach happened. The company has found no evidence of unauthorized activity on Equifax’s core consumer or commercial credit reporting databases.

The information accessed primarily includes names, Social Security numbers, birth dates, addresses and, in some instances, driver’s license numbers. In addition, credit card numbers for approximately 209,000 U.S. consumers, and certain dispute documents with personal identifying information for approximately 182,000 U.S. consumers, were accessed. As part of its investigation of this application vulnerability, Equifax also identified unauthorized access to limited personal information for certain UK and Canadian residents. Equifax will work with UK and Canadian regulators to determine appropriate next steps. The company has found no evidence that personal information of consumers in any other country has been impacted.

Equifax discovered the unauthorized access on July 29 of this year and acted immediately to stop the intrusion. The company promptly engaged a leading, independent cybersecurity firm that has been conducting a comprehensive forensic review to determine the scope of the intrusion, including the specific data impacted. Equifax also reported the criminal access to law enforcement and continues to work with authorities. While the company’s investigation is substantially complete, it remains ongoing and is expected to be completed in the coming weeks.

“This is clearly a disappointing event for our company, and one that strikes at the heart of who we are and what we do. I apologize to consumers and our business customers for the concern and frustration this causes,” said Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Richard F. Smith. “We pride ourselves on being a leader in managing and protecting data, and we are conducting a thorough review of our overall security operations. We also are focused on consumer protection and have developed a comprehensive portfolio of services to support all U.S. consumers, regardless of whether they were impacted by this incident.”

Equifax has established a dedicated website, to help consumers determine if their information has been potentially impacted and to sign up for credit file monitoring and identity theft protection. In addition to the website, Equifax will send direct mail notices to consumers whose credit card numbers or dispute documents with personal identifying information were impacted. Equifax also is in the process of contacting U.S. state and federal regulators and has sent written notifications to all U.S. state attorneys general, which includes Equifax contact information for regulator inquiries.

Equifax has engaged a leading, independent cybersecurity firm to conduct an assessment and provide recommendations on steps that can be taken to help prevent this type of incident from happening again.

CEO Smith said, “I’ve told our entire team that our goal can’t be simply to fix the problem and move on. Confronting cybersecurity risks is a daily fight. While we’ve made significant investments in data security, we recognize we must do more. And we will.”

There is a fine print “arbitration clause” which seeks to protect the company from class actions, but in a response to consumer inquiries, the company says the arbitration clause and class action waiver included in its terms of use does not apply to this cybersecurity incident.

Also, according to documents filed with securities regulators, three Equifax executives sold shares worth a combined $1.8 million just a few days after the company discovered the breach. However, Equifax has said the three executives “had no knowledge that an intrusion had occurred at the time they sold their shares.”

 

 

Auction Results 09 Sep 2017

The preliminary auction results are in from Domain.  It looks like a higher listing count and perhaps a higher clearance rate. Further evidence the market is far from dead!

Brisbane though cleared just 47% of 94 scheduled auctions, Adelaide 73% of 56 scheduled auctions (lots of interest from interstate investors) and Canberra 71% of 57 scheduled auctions.

The Light In the Tunnel – The Property Imperative 09 Sep 2017

A bunch of new data came out this week, so we discuss the findings and explore what it means for households and their budgets.

Welcome to the Property Imperative weekly to 9th September 2017, the latest edition of our finance and property news digest.

We released the August edition of our Mortgage Stress research which showed that across the nation, more than 860,000 households are estimated to be now in mortgage stress (last month 820,000) with more than 20,000 of these in severe stress. This equates to 26.4% of households, up from 25.8% last month.

The main drivers of stress are rising mortgage rates and living costs whilst real incomes continue to fall and underemployment is on the rise.  This is a deadly combination and is touching households across the country, not just in the mortgage belts. In August higher power prices, council rates and childcare costs hit home. You can watch our video where we walk through the post codes most at risk.

The latest Adelaide Bank/REIA Housing Affordability Report showed that buying a house became even less affordable during the June quarter with the proportion of median family income required to meet average home loan repayments increasing by 0.2 percentage points to 31.4 per cent.

Research from Mozo.com.au showed that one third of first time buyers were reliant on help from the Bank of Mum and Dad, and the average value of that assistance in NSW was $88,250. This is pretty similar to our own findings on the rise and rise of the Bank of Mum and Dad.

Data from Roy Morgan highlighted the fact that more Australians are now under-employed than at this time last year. 1.24 million (9.5%) Australians are under-employed (which means looking for work or looking for more work), up a significant 324,000 (2.4%) in a year. They also called the “real” unemployment rate at 10.2%, as opposed to the official ABS data of 5.6%.

CoreLogic said that while auction clearance rates were pretty firm, the volume of sales continued to fall.  But there is no stopping the housing train. Demand for property is still strong, but the mix of purchasers is changing as shown by the housing finance from the ABS which came out on Friday.

Owner occupied purchases are steaming ahead, while investment lending is stagnating. A clear reflection of the tightening in investor lending regulation, and the availability of new incentives and grants for first time buyers, alongside the attractor loan rates for new borrowers. We saw first time buyers more active in NSW and VIC, two states where new concessions started in July. The proportion of first home buyer commitments rose to 16.6% in July from 14.9% in June.  Just remember back in 2009 they comprised more than 30% of total transactions, so all the hype about the return of first time buyers is over done in our view.

But in July, trend lending flows were $33 billion, up 0.1% overall, with owner occupied lending up $20.8 billion or 0.7%, and Investment lending down 1% to $12.1 billion.  The number of owner occupied transactions rose 0.6%, construction of dwellings rose 2%, new dwellings 2% and the purchase of established dwellings 0.3%. As a result, total bank home lending stock rose again to $1.61 trillion, another record.

There are some amazing attractor mortgage loan offers in the market right now, as lenders fight for market share. We see significant falls in some investment property loan offer rates, as well as discounts for new owner occupied borrowers, with rates down to as low as 3.65%. These rates of course are not available for existing borrowers, the oldest trick in the book, so this may explain a rise in refinanced transactions.

ASIC launched a series of videos to help consumers make “MoneySmart” decisions when buying a home. Some would say, better late than never! The recommendations on budgeting are especially pertinent.  However, a weakness of the MoneySmart calculators are they are static, we think they need a calculator to show the impact of changing interest rates for example. That said, their TrackMySpend App is a really useful tool to get to grips with what is being spent.

The point is that our research shows households are exposed to potential future interest rate rises, and whilst lenders are required to factor in expense and interest rate buffers, they are probably not sufficient to protect borrowers in a rising rate environment, and in any case, the majority of borrowers do not understand the financial impact of such rises, nor are they planning for them. We think lenders should have an obligation to display the recalculated monthly repayment at an average long term rate, which would be at least 3% above current levels. Households would be shocked to see the impact, and it may reduce the overreach which many are locked into at the moment.  It all depends on when rates rise.

Treasurer Scott Morrison said that interest rates are “obviously” going to rise in the future but that many home owners would be able to avoid mortgage stress thanks to “mortgage buffers”.

It’s worth noting that ASIC is alleging Westpac used an expenditure benchmark that was based on “conservative” estimates of what a household would spend and “represents only an estimate of what Australian families consume”.

APRA said this week it is important that lenders accurately assess borrower income and living expenses. Living expenses, in particular, are difficult to measure, and so banks often utilise benchmarks as a proxy where borrower estimates appear too low. In fact, APRA’s recent work showed the lion’s share of loans by the larger lenders are assessed using expense benchmarks, rather than the borrower’s own estimates. There is nothing wrong in principle with using benchmarks, provided they aren’t seen as a substitute for proper inquiries of the borrower about their expenses.

Actually, in some cases, across the market, loans were being made where the borrower had only the slimmest of spare income.

The RBA Governor also warned that rates will rise at some point and discussed why lenders may trade off risks in their book against market share.  To stress the point about rate rises, Canada lifted their cash rate this week, and already there are signs of home price corrections following there. The RBA held the cash rate again this week, and they highlighted the fact that the growth in housing debt has been outpacing the slow growth in household incomes, as well as poor wage growth. They still hold their view on positive future growth.

Some of the economic news this week was quite positive, with ANZ job ads higher rising 2.0% m/m in August, the sixth straight rise. Job advertisements currently sit 13.3% higher than a year ago.

The current account data from the ABS showed a deficient increase to $9.6 billion, partly due to lower export commodity prices.  Exports grew faster than imports though.

Overall the economy grew 0.8% in the June quarter. This was below expectations and was helped by significant government investment. Household consumption figure were pretty solid, but at the expense of the household savings ratio which dipped to 4.6%, (5.3% in March). As a result, the current savings ratio is the lowest since 2008, thanks to very weak wage growth. The point though is this cannot continue indefinitely, because household savings are not infinite, and they are also skewed in distribution terms towards those with more assets and net worth.  Stress resides among households with lower net worth and little or no savings.

Dwelling construction grew a moderate 0.2 per cent with growth being observed in New South Wales and Queensland. On an annual basis GDP growth is 1.9%, and to meet the RBA’s expectations will need to lift over the next year or so. We are not sure where such growth will come from.  We need new ways to lift productivity.

Finally, Retail turnover was flat in July, further evidence of the pressure on household budgets after stronger growth earlier in the year.

So to conclude, we still see home lending growing faster than inflation or wage growth, lifting household debt higher. This is at a time when interest rates are clearly going to rise higher, later.

Lenders are still trading off risk against market share, because at the end of the day, households will pick up the tab in a crash. But households should not simply rely on an assurance from the bank they can afford a loan, they should do their own work, to calculate the real effect on their budgets of a 3% rate rise.  In fact, borrowing less is the best insurance against future stress.

And that’s the Property Imperative weekly to 9th September 2017. If you found this useful do subscribe to get our updates, and check back next week.

 

LIBOR Transition Creates Uncertainty for SF Market

Replacing LIBOR presents challenges for the structured finance (SF) market that are likely to be addressed in the context of industry-wide initiatives, Fitch Ratings says.

The long lead time and a desire to avoid disruption to floating-rate bond markets such as SF should support the transition to standard benchmarks as successor reference rates. The impact on SF will depend on which rates are adopted, how consensual the process is across all market participants, and how they deal with technical and administrative challenges.

LIBOR is the reference rate for SF bonds and related derivatives contracts in several large SF markets. Almost all of the USD450 billion of US CLO notes outstanding reference LIBOR, as do USD186 billion of US sub-prime/Alt-A RMBS and USD24 billion of US prime RMBS. US student loan ABS commonly reference LIBOR. Elsewhere, nearly all UK RMBS reference Libor. Some underlying loans, such as leveraged loans, US hybrid adjustable-rate mortgages, US student loans, and auto loans, reference LIBOR.

Panel banks will maintain LIBOR until end-2021. This gives capital markets four-and-a-half years to agree a successor regime for the bulk of bonds currently linked to LIBOR, enabling a coordinated transition to as few benchmarks as needed. This would avoid costly ad hoc negotiations and potentially complicated bespoke transaction amendments. Loan markets may follow suit, although the risk of fragmentation geographically and by asset class could create SF basis risk in respect of existing loans, or alter the level of credit-enhancing excess spread.

There are practical challenges in co-ordinating transition. Voting rights in SF transactions, in some cases requiring majority consent of all classes of notes, may complicate any amendment process and even increase the scope for inter-creditor disputes. Trustees will also have an important role in determining what conditions are placed on transaction parties. These challenges will require effective use of the long lead time available.

To preserve liquidity, we think bond markets will generally follow initiatives in the derivatives market, where funding is hedged and discount rates determined. The International Swaps and Derivatives Association is examining fall-back provisions in LIBOR swap contracts, and working groups in some jurisdictions have recommended alternative near-risk free reference rates for the derivatives market, including the Sterling Overnight Index Average (SONIA) in the UK and the Broad Treasuries Repo Financing Rate in the US.

But it remains unclear whether the eventual successors to LIBOR will be overnight rate benchmarks or forward rate benchmarks, how far this will vary from country to country, and whether loan markets will adopt the same reference rates at the same time (reducing basis risk). At the heart of these questions is the effect on the value of currently contracted interest payments.

Any move to replace LIBOR with a benchmark that increased interest costs, particularly for retail borrowers, would face political objections. But a reduction in interest earned could also face opposition. Balancing these interests may prompt efforts to adjust margins to leave loan and bond coupons unchanged. Challenges coordinating the transition for assets and liabilities could leave SF transactions with basis risk, or change the level of excess spread. Possible consequences for ratings would also depend on the weighted average life remaining after 2021.

Commercial borrower behaviour may contribute to these risks. For example, some commercial real estate and leveraged loans include fall-back provisions aimed at managing temporary disruptions in LIBOR determination (such as polling a small panel of banks). These could make it harder to co-ordinate the transition for underlying loans and SF bonds, particularly in the leveraged loan market.

Unlike floating-rate commercial mortgages, leveraged loans are typically not hedged against interest rate risk, and may have more latitude in diverging from standardised successor benchmarks emerging from the derivatives market. If leveraged loan borrowers felt it was in their commercial interests to argue that fall-back provisions apply, basis risk would arise if CLOs moved to more liquid successor benchmarks.

Underemployment Higher – Roy Morgan

Roy Morgan Research says that in August 1.324 million Australians were unemployed (10.2% of the workforce). This is similar to a year ago (down 8,000, or 0.2%). The “real” unemployment figures of 10.2% are substantially higher than the current ABS estimate for July 2017 (5.6%).

However more Australians are now under-employed than this time last year. 1.241 million (9.5%) Australians are under-employed (looking for work or looking for more work), up a significant 324,000 (2.4%) in a year.

Roy Morgan Monthly Unemployment & Under-employment - August 2017 - 19.7%

Source: Roy Morgan Single Source October 2005 – August 2017. Average monthly interviews 4,000.

This aligns with our own data on mortgage stress, which pointed to under-employment being one of the prime drivers of financial difficulty for many households.

 

Is the global financial system any safer than before?

The latest Bank of England KnowledgeBank discusses the impact of regulation since 2007.  They discuss, capital, shadow banking and banker remuneration.

The financial crisis that struck in 2007 was among the worst on record. And it was global in nature. Financial markets seized up, world trade plummeted and the global economy went into recession. The cost of supporting banking sectors around the world reached $15 trillion. And the impact on people’s lives was severe. Many lost their jobs or saw a fall in their wages.

What’s been done to fix the global financial system?

A decade on since the start of the crisis, what’s changed?

After the crisis hit, the G20 – made up of the leaders and central bank governors from 20 major economies – set up the Financial Stability Board, which is tasked with monitoring the global financial system and making recommendations to make it serve society better.

Since then, various reforms have taken place. The video below summarises these changes: from the amount of ‘capital’ banks need to have, to new rules on bankers’ pay. While there is more work to be done, the video argues that the global financial system is today safer, simpler and fairer than it was a decade ago:

Wall Street landlords are chasing the American dream

From The Conversation.

Owning a family home in the suburbs has been a cornerstone of the American dream for many generations. But in 2008, when the United States’ housing bubble burst and a spate of mortgage foreclosures triggered the global financial crisis, that dream was vanquished, and such houses would instead become the sites of shattered lives.

In the aftermath of the crisis, hundreds of thousands of suburban homes were repossessed and sold at auction. With the market in shambles, prices were low. Tightened credit made it hard for individuals to buy – even for those whose credit was not destroyed by the crisis. Investors saw an opportunity, and began buying up houses.

Though house prices have recovered in many regions of the US, many of the people living in these homes are now renting – and their landlords are some of the biggest investment firms on Wall Street. Of course, small scale, mostly local investors have long owned and rented out individual houses. But it simply wasn’t feasible to manage large numbers of individual homes at a distance. As technology changed, it became much more practical for large corporations to manage individual homes spread across different regions.

With access to credit and funds unavailable to the average home buyer, large investors have been able to enter the landlord market in ways that have never been seen before. Blackstone – the world’s largest alternative investment firm – pioneered new rent-backed financial instruments in 2013, whereby rent checks are bundled up and sold as securities, similar to the way that mortgage payments are turned into financial products bought by investors.

Now, Blackstone’s rental company Invitation Homes looks set to merge with Starwood Waypoint Homes; a move that would create the nation’s largest landlord, with roughly 82,000 homes across the country. Another Wall Street backed firm, American Homes 4 Rent, owns a further 49,000 homes across 22 states.

Renting the American dream

Since 2010, the United States has seen a massive rise in the number of families renting the kind of single-family houses that have long been the desire of would-be homeowners chasing the American dream. While estimates vary, the inventory of single family homes being rented has grown by anywhere from three to seven million (35% to 67%) compared with pre-crisis levels. Single-family houses are now the most common form of rental property in the United States.

Overwhelmingly, the people living in these houses are families. Our ongoing research with Jake Wegmann of the University of Texas and Deirdre Pfeiffer of Arizona State University shows that almost half of Single Family Rented (SFR) households (49%) have at least one child under 18; a far greater percentage than rental properties with multiple units (roughly 25%) and owner-occupied homes (31%).

According to our own analysis of the American Community Survey, in 2015 an estimated 14.5m children in the United States lived in a rented single-family home. Demographically, single-family renters are more likely than owners to be people of colour, and to face moderate or severe housing cost burdens. The upshot of all this is that the 40m or so people living in SFR homes now form the basis of a new asset class of rental-backed securities.

Destination unknown

Scaling up portfolios consisting of thousands or tens of thousands of rental homes has made it possible for Wall Street firms to roll out financial instruments suited to “a rentership society”. Securitisation allows big investors to borrow against the value of the properties, to buy more properties and pay off old debt, and acts as a loan that tenants pay back with their rent checks.

Wall Street is no stranger to the housing business in America. But their involvement as landlords of single-family homes is new, and so are the financial instruments they have developed. The impact of Wall Street’s new role is unclear. While rehabilitating houses and helping to stabilise home values in the hardest-hit markets, they may also be crowding out first-time buyers, creating a lopsided market that shuts out would-be owner-occupiers.

Some Wall Street landlords have been singled out for poor repairs, problems with billing and collections and lacklustre customer service. There is also growing concern about the fact that renters of single-family homes have little protection, even in cities with some form of rent control. A report from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta found that large corporate owners of houses are more likely than smaller landlords to evict tenants; some filed eviction notices on up to a third of their renters in just one year.

Here to stay

Wall Street landlords are also making new political allies, hinting they intend to stick around. The largest single-family rental companies have banded together to form a trade group, the National Rental Home Council, which promotes large-scale, single-family rental housing and advocates for public policies friendly to their interests. And it seems to be working.

In an unprecedented move, just after President Trump’s inauguration, the government-backed mortgage agency, Fannie Mae, agreed to underwrite Blackstone’s initial public offering of Invitation Homes stock, to the tune of a billion dollars. Blackstone’s CEO is Steve Schwarzman, one of the president’s most loyal backers. And Thomas Barrack – the recently departed leader of Colony Starwood Homes, which is preparing to merge with Invitation Homes – is a longtime friend of the mogul-turned-president.

Meanwhile, another government-backed agency, Freddie Mac, has announced that it too was supporting investment in single-family rentals, but with a focus on financing for mid-size investors and with an explicit goal of maintaining rental affordability. Non-partisan organisations like the Urban Institute have also suggested that government-backed financing opportunities could help single-family rental serve as a new affordable housing strategy.

All of these developments suggest that the downward trend in home ownership after the financial crisis could be here to stay. And while there is nothing wrong with renting – just as there is nothing inherently good about owning – the changes we are seeing in the single-family rental market bear ongoing scrutiny, to ensure that Wall Street’s demand for profit does not once again wreak havoc on Main Street.

Authors: Desiree Fields, Lecturer in Urban Geography, University of Sheffield; Alex Schafran, Lecturer in Urban Geography, University of Leeds; Zac Taylor, PhD Candidate in Geography, University of Leeds

After LIBOR

RBA Deputy Governor Guy Debelle spoke about Interest Rate Benchmarks at FINSA today. He made three points:

First, the longevity of LIBOR cannot be assumed, so any contracts that reference LIBOR will need to be reviewed.

Second, actions to ensure the longevity of BBSW are well advanced. While these changes entail some costs, the cost of not doing so would be considerably larger.

Third, consider whether risk-free benchmarks are more appropriate rates for financial contracts than credit-based benchmarks such as LIBOR and BBSW.

Today I am going to talk again about interest rate benchmarks, as recently there have been some important developments internationally and in Australia. These benchmarks are at the heart of the plumbing of the financial system. They are widely referenced in financial contracts. Corporate borrowing rates are often priced as a spread to an interest rate benchmark. Many derivative contracts are based on them, as are most asset-backed securities. In light of the issues around the London Inter-Bank Offered Rate (LIBOR) and other benchmarks that have arisen over the past decade, there has been an ongoing global reform effort to improve the functioning of interest rate benchmarks.

I will focus on the recent announcement by the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) on the future of LIBOR, and the implications of this for Australian financial markets. I will then summarise the current state of play in Australia, particularly for the major interest rate benchmark, the bank bill swap rate (BBSW). Our aim is to ensure that BBSW remains a robust benchmark for the long term. I will also discuss the important role for ‘risk-free’ interest rates as an alternative to credit-based benchmarks such as BBSW and LIBOR.

The Future of LIBOR and the Implications for Australia

LIBOR is the key interest rate benchmark for several major currencies, including the US dollar and British pound. Just over a month ago, Andrew Bailey, who heads the FCA which regulates LIBOR, raised some serious questions about the sustainability of LIBOR. The key problem he identified is that there are not enough transactions in the short-term wholesale funding market for banks to anchor the benchmark. The banks that make the submissions used to calculate LIBOR are uncomfortable about continuing to do this, as they have to rely mainly on their ‘expert judgment’ in determining where LIBOR should be rather than on actual transactions. To prevent LIBOR from abruptly ceasing to exist, the FCA has received assurances from the current banks on the LIBOR panel that they will continue to submit their estimates to sustain LIBOR until the end of 2021. But beyond that point, there is no guarantee that LIBOR will continue to exist. The FCA will not compel banks to provide submissions and the panel banks may not voluntarily continue to do so.

This four year notice period should give market participants enough time to transition away from LIBOR, but the process will not be easy. Market participants that use LIBOR, including those in Australia, need to work on transitioning their contracts to alternative reference rates. This is a significant issue, since LIBOR is referenced in around US$350 trillion worth of contracts globally. While a large share of these contracts have short durations, often three months or less, a very sizeable share of current contracts extend beyond 2021, with some lasting as long as 100 years.

This is also an issue in Australia, where we estimate that financial institutions have around $5 trillion in contracts referencing LIBOR. Finding a replacement for LIBOR is not straightforward. Regulators around the world have been working closely with the industry to identify alternative risk-free rates that can be used instead of LIBOR, and to strengthen the fall-back provisions that would apply in contracts if LIBOR was to be discontinued. The transition will involve a substantial amount of work for users of LIBOR, both to amend contracts and update systems.

Ensuring BBSW Remains a Robust Benchmark

The equivalent interest rate benchmark for the Australian dollar is BBSW, and the Council of Financial Regulators (CFR) is working closely with industry to ensure that it remains a robust financial benchmark. BBSW is currently calculated from executable bids and offers for bills issued by the major banks. A major concern over recent years has been the low trading volumes at the time of day that BBSW is measured (around 10 am). There are two key steps that are being taken to support BBSW: first, the BBSW methodology is being strengthened to enable the benchmark to be calculated directly from a wider set of market transactions; and second, a new regulatory framework for financial benchmarks is being introduced.

The work on strengthening the BBSW methodology is progressing well. The ASX, the Administrator of BBSW, has been working closely with market participants and the regulators on finalising the details of the new methodology. This will involve calculating BBSW as the volume weighted average price (VWAP) of bank bill transactions. It will cover a wider range of institutions during a longer trading window. The ASX has also been consulting market participants on a new set of trading guidelines for BBSW, and this process has the strong support of the CFR. The new arrangements will not only anchor BBSW to a larger set of transactions, but will improve the infrastructure in the bank bill market, encouraging more electronic trading and straight-through processing of transactions. The critical difference between BBSW and LIBOR is that there are enough transactions in the local bank bill market each day relative to the size of our financial system to calculate a robust benchmark.

For the new BBSW methodology to be implemented successfully, the institutions that participate in the bank bill market will need to start trading bills at outright yields rather than the current practice of agreeing to the transaction at the yet-to-be-determined BBSW rate. This change of behaviour needs to occur at the banks that issue the bank bills, as well as those that buy them including the investment funds and state treasury corporations. The RBA is also playing its part. Market participants have asked us to move our open market operations to an earlier time to support liquidity in the bank bill market during the trading window, and we have agreed to do this.

While we all have to make some changes to systems and practices to support the new methodology, the investment in a more robust BBSW will be well worth it. The alternative of rewriting a very large number of contracts and re-engineering systems should BBSW cease to exist would be considerably more painful.

The new regulatory framework for financial benchmarks that the government is in the process of introducing should provide market participants with more certainty. Treasury recently completed a consultation on draft legislation that sets out how financial benchmarks will be regulated, and the bill has just been introduced into Parliament. In addition, ASIC recently released more detail about how the regulatory regime would be implemented. This should help to address the uncertainty that financial institutions participating in the BBSW rate setting process have been facing. It should also support the continued use of BBSW in the European Union, where new regulations will soon come into force that require benchmarks used in the EU to be subject to a robust regulatory framework.

Risk-free Rates as Alternative Benchmarks

While the new VWAP methodology will help ensure that BBSW remains a robust benchmark, it is important for market participants to ask whether BBSW is the most appropriate benchmark for the financial contract.

For some financial products, it can make sense to reference a risk-free rate instead of a credit-based reference rate. For instance, floating rate notes (FRNs) issued by governments, non-financial corporations and securitisation trusts, which are currently priced at a spread to BBSW, could instead tie their coupon payments to the cash rate.

However, for other products, it makes sense to continue referencing a credit-based benchmark that measures banks’ short-term wholesale funding costs. This is particularly the case for products issued by banks, such as FRNs and corporate loans. The counterparties to these products would still need derivatives that reference BBSW so that they can hedge their interest rate exposures.

It is also prudent for users of any benchmark to have planned for a scenario where the benchmark no longer exists. The general approach that is being taken internationally to address the risk of benchmarks such as LIBOR being discontinued, is to develop risk-free benchmark rates. A number of jurisdictions including the UK and the US have recently announced their preferred risk-free rates.

One issue yet to be resolved is that most of these rates are overnight rates. A term market for these products is yet to be developed, although one could expect that to occur through time. Another complication is that the risk-free rates are not equivalent across jurisdictions. Some reference an unsecured rate (including Australia and the UK) while others reference a secured rate like the repo rate in the US.

As the RBA’s operational target for monetary policy and the reference rate for OIS (overnight index swap) and other financial contracts, the cash rate is the risk-free interest rate benchmark for the Australian dollar. The RBA measures the cash rate directly from transactions in the interbank overnight cash market, and we have ensured that our methodology is in line with the IOSCO benchmark principles. However, the cash rate is not a perfect substitute for BBSW, as it is an overnight rate rather than a term rate, and doesn’t incorporate a significant bank credit risk premium.

Bank Capital and the approaching BEAR

Wayne Byers, Chairman of APRA spoke today at the ‘The Regulators’ Finsia event, Sydney.

His specific comments on bank lending practice, in terms of household affordability, benchmarks, pre-existing debt and overrides are important.

Unquestionably strong capital ratios
I’ll start with bank capital.
The quest for an answer to what ‘unquestionably strong’ capital ratios look like has been with us since the Financial System Inquiry (FSI) reported in late 2014. We had been keen to wrap up this recommendation alongside the international reforms we had hoped would emanate from the Basel Committee well before now. Once the Basel Committee’s deadline was missed, we indicated we didn’t think it appropriate to wait any longer to respond to the FSI.
So as you know, in July this year we set out our assessment on how much APRA’s minimum capital requirements would need to be strengthened for the banking sector to have capital ratios that would unquestionably be considered strong. For the major banks, for example, we flagged that we intended to increase their applicable capital requirements by 150 basis points, with a view to having them operate with a Common Equity Tier 1 (CET1) capital ratio of at least 10.5 per cent. For smaller ADIs that don’t use internal models to determine their capital requirements, the increase in minimum CET1 requirements will be less – in the order of 50 basis points. And we set out our expectation that these new benchmarks could be achieved in an orderly fashion by the beginning of 2020, if not before.
This announcement was designed to give the industry greater clarity as to the ultimate destination, and the time they had to reach it. What we haven’t done yet is identify exactly which parts of the capital framework we’ll adjust to deliver this increase. The adjustments – which we plan to say more about around the end of this year – are expected to accommodate domestic measures to target residential mortgage lending – about which I’ll comment more shortly – as well as changes eventuating from (we hope) the finalisation of the outstanding Basel III reforms.
I think our information paper was fairly well understood, but there’s possibly still some uncertainty about the impact of the future changes, and whether this will mean, for example, more capital might be required beyond that needed to meet the 10.5 per cent benchmark. That’s not our intent. If a major bank has sufficient dollars of capital to be above the 10.5 per cent benchmark under the current capital framework, we expect that – all other things being equal – it will have sufficient capital to meet whatever new requirements we implement.
However, its reported capital ratio may well change. When we change measures of capital and risk weights, we’re effectively using a new measurement system. A bank’s underlying position doesn’t change, even though the measure used to signify it generates a different ratio. The best analogy I can offer is when I switch from measuring my height in inches to centimetres: the number I report is larger but I haven’t gotten any taller. So as we revise the measurement of capital, it’s possible that the 10.5 per cent benchmark for the major banks may also change. But what’s important to remember is that that is primarily a difference in the units of measurement, rather than a change to the underlying capital requirement.
Housing lending
In thinking about where and how we allocate increases in capital requirements, we’ve flagged that at least some of it will be generated by addressing the risk in housing loan portfolios. There are two inter-related aspects to this: risk sensitivity (ensuring higher risk lending has appropriately higher capital requirements) and concentration risk (dealing with the dominance of housing lending on the balance sheet of the banking system). That shouldn’t be taken to imply that there will be a dramatic increase in capital requirements for housing lending. But housing is an obvious place to start in delivering stronger capital ratios.
Having said that, we don’t see more capital as the sole means to build resilience in bank balance sheets. We are spending just as much time on the quality of lending, and reinforcing sound lending standards. We do so for good reason. Done well, housing lending can be an important source of stability to bank balance sheets in times of stress. Overseas experience shows us what can happen when done poorly.
Here I’d like to like to make a distinction that will be important for our work in 2018: oversight of lending policies, and scrutiny of lending practices. For credit standards to be genuinely raised, both need attention: policies should be strengthened where needed, but they also must be genuinely put into practice.
Prudent policies
APRA’s oversight of lending policies has involved several steps. We’ve sought assurances from Boards that they were actively monitoring their credit standards. We’ve collected more granular data. We issued industry guidance on prudent mortgage risk management. As the risk environment continued to elevate, we took the somewhat unusual step of establishing specific benchmarks for investor loan growth and interest rate assumptions in serviceability assessments. Earlier this year, we added an industry benchmark on interest-only lending.
Overall, we see these measures as having a positive impact. We’ve seen serviceability assessments strengthen, investor loan growth slow and high LVR lending reduce. New interest-only lending has also fallen, and appears on track to fall below our benchmark later this year. All of these moves are strengthening the quality of banks’ home loan portfolios, in an environment that continues to be one of heightened risk.
Prudent practices
However, firmer lending policies are one thing. What if they aren’t always followed? We’ve therefore looked harder at actual lending practices, seeking additional assurance that tighter loan policies are actually translating into more prudent lending decisions.
While the review process is not yet complete, APRA has three core expectations in this area.
  • Firstly, it’s important that lenders accurately assess borrower income and living expenses. Living expenses, in particular, are difficult to measure, and so banks often utilise benchmarks as a proxy where borrower estimates appear too low. In fact, our recent work showed the lion’s share of loans by the larger lenders are assessed using expense benchmarks, rather than the borrower’s own estimates. There is nothing wrong in principle with using benchmarks, provided they aren’t seen as a substitute for proper inquiries of the borrower about their expenses. Benchmarks also need to be genuinely representative, incorporate a degree of conservatism, and responsive to a changing external environment. We still see scope for improvement here.
  • Secondly, a lender should have robust controls to check for information on borrowers’ pre-existing debts, to ensure that all debt repayments are accurately factored into loan assessments. Here, the industry has been slow to adopt positive credit reporting, creating a blind spot in terms of sound credit assessments. A move to positive credit reporting is needed to mitigate this shortcoming.
  • Finally, there should be effective oversight to ensure that lending practices consistently meet standards, with close management of any policy overrides, and well-targeted assurance processes. Stronger policies mean little if they can be overridden, or if data deficiencies mean compliance with policy cannot be fully monitored.
As I’ve made clear before, APRA’s supervision isn’t about managing conditions in the housing market or house prices; we have a simpler goal of ensuring that core standards stand up to scrutiny, both in policy and in practice. Given the environment that we are in – high house prices, high household debt, low interest rates and subdued income growth – that scrutiny won’t lessen any time soon.
Banking Executive Accountability Regime
I’d like now to turn to the package of measures announced by the Government in the budget to improve accountability in the banking system – now fondly known as the BEAR.
APRA has long had an interest in establishing appropriate accountability frameworks for regulated institutions. Tools to promote this are the standard fare of prudential regulators, and already exist within the Banking Act 1959 (for example, the power to remove and/or disqualify individuals from their roles) and our own prudential standards (in terms of requirements in relation to governance, remuneration and the fitness and propriety of individuals).
Therefore, the BEAR can be seen as a strengthening of the existing prudential framework. Although there are a range of new elements, it is not new territory.
Our existing regime – seen as overbearing (no pun intended) when it was introduced – would now be seen internationally as somewhat limited. APRA has therefore been providing input to Government on the overall design of the BEAR. Changes to the Banking Act will set out the overarching framework, to ensure that it achieves the Government’s objective that the BEAR has ‘teeth’, but it will then be up to APRA to implement the framework through our supervision process. It will also necessitate consequential changes to our supporting prudential standards.
Given the legislation is still being drafted, it is difficult to be precise about how the new regime will work. But the core objective – establishing clearer accountabilities for, and expected standards of behaviour by, senior executives within banks – is difficult to argue against. Indeed, once the new framework is put in place for banks, APRA intends to think about whether some of the concepts within the regime have broader application.
There have been questions raised about whether aspects of the new accountability regime will change the nature of APRA supervision. While our supervisory approach is always evolving, we intend to remain a supervision-led regulator, working to prevent problems rather than simply wait for them to happen and find fault after the event.
If we are successful in that approach, the new powers granted to APRA should only need to be used rarely. That should not be interpreted as saying we would be reluctant to use them. But the goal must be that, with clear boundaries and obligations set out by the regulatory framework, Boards and executives conduct their affairs in such a manner that intervention by APRA is not needed. It is a much better outcome, for example, that Boards hold their executives to account for poor outcomes than have to rely on the regulator to do it for them. My observation is that this has been the experience in the UK, where a similar regime is already in place. Although there are strong powers for regulators if and when needed, the industry has responded by adjusting the way it operates so that the need for regulatory intervention has been quite limited.
Concluding remarks
The three topics that I’ve talked about today are ultimately focussed on one underlying purpose: strengthening the resilience of the banking system. Whether it is in bank capital, the quality of loan portfolios, or promoting better governance and accountability, the objective is to ensure banks are well-governed, prudently managed, and financially sound. Banks that have these characteristics are most likely to meet the needs of the Australian community, through good times and times of adversity. So we see APRA’s ongoing intensive efforts in all these three areas in the year ahead as a very necessary investment for us to make.