Chain bankruptcy size in inter-bank networks: the effects of asset price volatility and the network structure

One bankruptcy of a certain bank can make another bank go bankrupt. This phenomenon is called chain bankruptcy. Chain bankruptcy is a kind of “systemic risk,” a topic that has received a great deal of attention from researchers, recently. Here, we analyzed the effect of the asset price fluctuation and the inter-bank lending and borrowing network on chain bankruptcy by using an agent-based simulation. We found that: (1) as the rate of change in asset price grows, the total number of bankruptcies increases. On the other hand, when the rate of change in asset prices exceeds a certain value, the total number of bankruptcies became unvarying; (2) as the density of links increases, the total number of bankruptcies decreases, except when a certain situation occurs in core–periphery networks. These results suggest that factors causing bankruptcy are asset price fluctuations and the network structure of the inter-bank network.