The Illiquidity of Corporate Bonds
December 04, 2012
This paper examines the illiquidity of corporate bonds and its asset-pricing implications. Using transaction-level data from 2003 through 2009, we show that the illiquidity in corporate bonds is substantial, significantly greater than what can be explained by bidask spreads. We establish a strong link between bond illiquidity and bond prices, both in aggregate and in the cross-section. In aggregate, changes in the market level illiquidity explain a substantial part of the time variation in yield spreads of high-rated (AAA through A) bonds, over-shadowing the credit risk component. In the cross-section, the bond-level illiquidity measure explains individual bond yield spreads with large economic significance.