Effect of Margin Requirement on Default Risk and Liquidity in the Korean Futures Market Open Access

Margin requirements are often viewed as an effective policy tool to prevent the default risk and maintain market stability. For the Korean futures market, this paper examines whether the margin requirements work normally as a tool to prevent default risk and margin changes have impact on futures trading activity. KOSPI200 stock index futures, USD (U.S. Dollar) futures, and 3-year KTB (Korean Treasury Bond) futures are included in the sample for the period from 2010 to 2015. Using the simulation method assuming the worst situation, we find that the possibility of default occurs once for KOSPI200 futures, twice for 3-year KTB futures, and 7 times for USD futures during the sample period. This result suggests that active margin requirement policy is necessary to prepare for financial market turbulence. In addition, we find that the margin changes do not have a significant impact on the futures trading activity, suggesting that decreases in margins are not effective means to improve liquidity in the Korean futures market