Management’s Discussion and Analysis
Market Risk
Our automotive financing, mortgage, and insurance activities give rise to market risk, representing the potential loss in the fair value of assets or liabilities caused by movements in market variables, such as interest rates, foreign exchange rates and equity prices. We are primarily exposed to interest rate risk arising from changes in interest rates related to financing, investing and cash management activities. More specifically, we have entered into contracts to provide financing, to retain mortgage servicing rights and to retain various assets related to securitization activities, all of which are exposed in varying degrees to changes in value due to movements in interest rates. Interest rate risk arises from the mismatch between assets and the related liabilities used for funding. We enter into various financial instruments, including derivatives, to maintain the desired level of exposure to the risk of interest rate fluctuations. Refer to Note 15 to our Consolidated Financial Statements for further information.
We are exposed to foreign currency risk arising from the possibility that fluctuations in foreign exchange rates will impact future earnings or asset and liability values related to our global operations. Our most significant foreign currency exposures relate to the Euro, the Canadian dollar, the British pound sterling, Brazilian real, Mexican peso and the Australian dollar.
We are also exposed to equity price risk, primarily in our Insurance operations, which invests in equity securities that are subject to price risk influenced by capital market movements. Our equity securities are considered investments and we do not enter into derivatives to modify the risks associated with our Insurance investment portfolio.
While the diversity of our activities from our complementary lines of business naturally mitigates market risk, we also actively manage this risk. We maintain risk management control systems to monitor interest rate, foreign currency exchange rate and equity price risks and related hedge positions. Positions are monitored using a variety of analytical techniques including market value, sensitivity analysis and value at risk models.
Additional risks include credit risk and lease residual risk.
Value at Risk
One of the measures we use to manage market risk is Value at Risk (VaR), which gauges the dollar amount of potential loss in fair value from adverse interest rate and currency movements in an ordinary market. The VaR model uses a distribution of historical changes in market prices to assess the potential for future losses. In addition, VaR takes into account correlations between risks and the potential for movements in one portfolio to offset movements in another.
We measure VaR using a 95% confidence interval and an assumed one month holding period, meaning that we would expect to incur changes in fair value greater than those predicted by VaR in only one out of every 20 months. Currently, our VaR measurements do not include all of our market risk sensitive positions. The VaR estimates encompass the majority (approximately 90%) of our market risk sensitive positions, which management believes are representative of all positions. The following table represents the maximum, average and minimum potential VaR losses measured for the years indicated.
Year ended December 31, ($ in millions) |
2006 |
2005 |
||||
Value at Risk |
||||||
Maximum |
$159 |
$239 |
||||
Average |
84 |
129 |
||||
Minimum |
27 |
66 |
||||
While no single risk statistic can reflect all aspects of market risk, the VaR measurements provide an overview of our exposure to changes in market influences. Less than 2% of our assets are accounted for as trading activities (i.e., those in which changes in fair value directly affect earnings). As such, our VaR measurements are not indicative of the impact to current period earnings caused by potential market movements. The actual earnings impact would differ because the accounting for our financial instruments is a combination of historical cost, lower of cost or market and fair value (as further described in the accounting policies in Note 20 to our Consolidated Financial Statements).
Sensitivity Analysis
While VaR reflects the risk of loss due to unlikely events in a normal market, sensitivity analysis captures our exposure to isolated hypothetical movements in specific market rates. The following analyses, which include Capmark’s financial instruments for 2005 that are exposed to changes in interest rates, foreign exchange rates and equity prices, are based on sensitivity analyses performed assuming instantaneous, parallel shifts in market exchange rates, interest rate yield curves and equity prices.
2006 |
2005 |
|||||||||||
December 31, ($ in millions) |
Non-trading |
Trading |
(a) |
Non-trading |
Trading |
(a) |
||||||
Financial instruments exposed to changes in: |
||||||||||||
Interest rates |
||||||||||||
Estimated fair value |
$ |
(35,614 |
) |
$ |
4,784 |
$ |
(26,609 |
) |
$ |
4,580 |
||
Effect of 10% adverse change in rates |
(1,090 |
) |
92 |
(1,662 |
) |
127 |
||||||
Foreign exchange rates |
||||||||||||
Estimated fair value |
$ |
(16,936 |
) |
$ |
222 |
$ |
(7,177 |
) |
$ |
254 |
||
Effect of 10% adverse change in rates |
1,694 |
(22 |
) |
718 |
(25 |
) |
||||||
Equity prices |
||||||||||||
Estimated fair value |
$ |
574 |
$ |
– |
$ |
2,367 |
$ |
– |
||||
Effect of 10% decrease in prices |
(57 |
) |
– |
(236 |
) |
– |
||||||
(a) Includes our trading investment securities. Refer to Note 5 to our Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on our investment securities portfolio. |
There are certain shortcomings inherent to the sensitivity analysis data presented. The models assume that interest rate and foreign exchange rate changes are instantaneous parallel shifts. In reality, changes are rarely instantaneous or parallel, and therefore, the sensitivities summarized in the foregoing table may be overstated. While this sensitivity analysis is our best estimate of the impacts of the scenarios described, actual results could differ from those projected.
Because they do not represent financial instruments, our operating leases are not required to be included in the interest rate sensitivity analysis. This exclusion is significant to the overall analysis and any resulting conclusions. While the sensitivity analysis shows an estimated fair value change for the debt which funds our operating lease portfolio, a corresponding change for our operating lease portfolio (which had a carrying value of $24.2 billion and $31.2 billion at December 31, 2006 and 2005, respectively) was excluded from the foregoing analysis. As a result, the overall impact to the estimated fair value of financial instruments from hypothetical changes in interest and foreign currency exchange rates is greater than what we would experience in the event of such market movements.