Asset swap

In financial accounting, an asset swap is an exchange of tangible assets for intangible assets or vice versa. Since it is a swap of assets, the procedure takes place on the active side of the balance sheet and has no impact on the latter in regard to volume. As an example, a company may sell equity and receive the value in cash, thus increasing liquidity.

A company often utilizes this method when in need for money to invest (internal financing) or to pay off debts.

In finance, the term asset swap has a particular meaning. When one refers to an asset swap, one has in mind the exchange of the flow of payments from a given security (the asset) for a different set of cash flows. An example of this is where an institution swaps the cash flows on a U.S. Government Bond for LIBOR minus a spread (say 20 basis points). Such swaps usually have stub periods in order to bring the chronology of the cash flows into line with that of the underlying bond.

Introduction

An asset swap enables an investor to buy a fixed rate bond and then hedge out the interest rate risk by swapping the fixed payments to floating. In doing so the investor retains the credit risk to the fixed-rate bond and earns a corresponding return. The asset swap market was born along with the swap market in the early 1990s, and continued to be most widely used by banks which use asset swaps to convert their long-term fixed rate assets to floating rate in order to match their short-term liabilities (depositor accounts). The asset swap market is over-the-counter (OTC), i.e., not traded on any exchange.