Search Frictions and Product Design in the Municipal Bond Market
研究美国市政债券市场中产品设计如何影响搜索摩擦，中介机构利用这一渠道增加租金，并量化债券标准化政策的福利影响。
This paper shows that product design shapes search frictions and that intermediaries leverage this channel to increase their rents in the context of the U.S. municipal bond market. The majority of bonds are designed via negotiation between a local government and its underwriter. They are then traded in a decentralized market, where the underwriter often also acts as an intermediary. Exploiting variations in state regulations that limit government officials' conflicts of interest, we provide evidence that the underwriter benefits from designing and trading complex bonds, which induces an increase in search frictions. Interestingly, a simpler bond may not necessarily benefit the government, as bond complexity affords flexibility in debt repayment. Motivated by these findings, we build and estimate a model of bond origination and trading to quantify the welfare implications of a policy mandating bond standardization.