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on Banking |
| By: | Gabriel Jiménez; Jose A. Lopez; Jesús Saurina |
| Abstract: | A common assumption in the academic literature and in the actual supervision of banking systems worldwide is that franchise value plays a key role in limiting bank risk-taking. As the underlying source of franchise value is assumed to be market power, reduced competition has been considered to promote banking stability. Boyd and De Nicolo (2005) propose an alternative view where concentration in the loan market could lead to increased borrower debt loads and a corresponding increase in loan defaults that undermine bank stability. Martinez-Miera and Repullo (2007) encompass both approaches by proposing a nonlinear relationship between competition and bank risk-taking. Using unique datasets for the Spanish banking system, we examine the empirical nature of that relationship. After controlling for macroeconomic conditions and bank characteristics, we find that standard measures of market concentration do not affect the ratio of non-performing commercial loans (NPL), our measure of bank risk. However, using Lerner indexes based on bank-specific interest rates, we find a negative relationship between loan market power and bank risk. This result provides evidence in favor of the franchise value paradigm. |
| Keywords: | Bank competition |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedfwp:2007-23&r=ban |
| By: | Frederick Furlong; John Krainer |
| Abstract: | We develop new techniques to assess the relationship between commercial bank performance and the economic conditions in the markets in which they operate. In the analysis, we allow for heterogeneity in the responses of banks to regional economic conditions. We find a statistically significant relationship between bank performance and shocks to the regional markets in which they operate. We find that region-specific shocks have a significant and persistent effect on the cross-sectional variance of bank performance in the market. That is, shocks affecting average performance of banks in a region also tend to increase the dispersion of their performance. We demonstrate that this effect is due to heterogeneity in the banks' exposures to their regional economies. Moreover, by allowing for this heterogeneity, we find that systematic responses to regional economic effects are notably more important in explaining the variation in bank performance than suggested by analysis in which responses are constrain to be the same for all banks. |
| Keywords: | Banks and banking ; Bank profits |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedfwp:2007-21&r=ban |
| By: | Raquel Lago González; Jose A. Lopez; Jesús Saurina |
| Abstract: | Access to external finance is a key determinant of a firm's ability to develop, operate and expand. To date, the literature has examined a variety of macroeconomic and microeconomic factors that influence firm financing. In this paper, we examine access by Spanish firms to external financing, both from bank and non-bank sources. We use dynamic panel data estimation techniques to estimate our models over a sample of 60,000 firms during the period from 1992 to 2002. We find that Spanish firms are quite dependent on short-term non-bank financing (such as trade credit), which makes up about 65 percent of total firm debt. Our results indicate that this type of financing is less sensitive to firm characteristics than short-term bank financing. However, we also find that short-term bank debt seems to be accessed more during economic expansions, which may suggest a substitution away from non-bank financing as firm conditions improve. Short-term bank debt also seems to be accessed more as funding rates rise, possibly again suggesting a substitution away from higher-priced non-bank alternatives. Using data from the Spanish Credit Register maintained by the Banco de Espana, we find that the impact of funding costs on access to external financing, whether from banks or non-banks, is affected by the nature of borrowing firms' bank relationships and collateral. In particular, we provide evidence of a potential hold-up problem in loan markets. Moreover, collateral plays a key role in making long-term finance available to firms. |
| Keywords: | Bank competition |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedfwp:2007-22&r=ban |
| By: | Cantillo, Miguel (IESE Business School) |
| Abstract: | The paper studies the market reaction to the withdrawal of a prominent private bank -Kuhn Loeb- from the board of several firms. The event study shows that although Kuhn Loeb added significant value to the firms where it had a board seat, most of this value came from reduced industry competition. Moreover, it seems that weaker competition manifested itself in monopoly rather than monopsony power. This article analyzes the event's context -the Armstrong Investigation in 1905- and the political currents that eventually prevented private banks from being activist shareholders in the United States. |
| Keywords: | Antitrust; Corporate governance; Financial history; |
| JEL: | G21 G24 K21 L41 N21 |
| Date: | 2007–07–17 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ebg:iesewp:d-0700&r=ban |
| By: | Robert M. Adams; Dean F. Amel |
| Abstract: | The threat of entry is an important factor in the evaluation of the potential competitive effects of proposed mergers and acquisitions. In the evaluation of proposed bank mergers, a high probability of entry, or strong potential competition, is often found to mitigate the potential anticompetitive effect of a proposed horizontal merger. Because the probability of entry is not directly observed for each local market, variables such as per capita income, population growth and past entry are typically used to predict the probability of future entry. This study extends previous research on the determinants of entry into local banking markets. In addition to variables considered by past research, such as market demographic characteristics, branching deregulation and past merger activity, this study considers the effects on future entry of past entry and strategic barriers to entry, which are proxied by changes in incumbent branching, the presence of small incumbent firms and market concentration. The analysis uses data that allow a broader definition of entry than that used in most past research. In most of the previous studies, bank entry is defined as the creation of a new banking institution. We show that this definition is problematic and misses entry due to branch network extension by existing banks, which is substantial. Results of our analysis are consistent with past research where past research exists. In addition, we find significant negative relationships between strategic barriers to entry and entry. Assessment of the quantitative significance of the results, however, finds that very large changes in the explanatory variables are needed to cause substantial changes in the probability of entry into banking markets. |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2007-51&r=ban |
| By: | Dagfinn Rime; Genaro Sucarrat |
| Abstract: | We study the role played by geographic and bank-size heterogeneity in the relation between exchange rate variability and market activity. We find some support for the hypothesis that increases in short-term global interbank market activity, which can be interpreted as due to variation in information arrival, increase variability. However, our results do not suggest that local short-term activity increases variability. With respect to long-term market activity, which can be interpreted as a measure of liquidity, we find that large and small banks have opposite effects. Specifically, our results suggest that the local group of large banks' liquidity increases variability, whereas the local group of small banks' liquidity reduces variability. |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cte:werepe:we077039&r=ban |
| By: | Greenwood, Jeremy; Sanchez, Juan M; Wang, Cheng |
| Abstract: | How does technological progress in financial intermediation affect the economy? To address this question a costly-state verification framework is embedded into a standard growth model. In particular, financial intermediaries can invest resources to monitor the returns earned by firms. The inability to monitor perfectly leads to firms earning rents. Undeserving firms are financed, while deserving ones are under funded. A more efficient monitoring technology squeezes the rents earned by firms. With technological advance in the financial sector, the economy moves continuously from a credit-rationing equilibrium to a perfectly efficient competitive equilibrium. A numerical example suggests that finance is important for growth. |
| Date: | 2007–10–18 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:isu:genres:12848&r=ban |
| By: | Anja Lambrecht (London Business School); Katja Seim (Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania); Catherine Tucker (MIT) |
| Abstract: | Online applications and services automate communications and transactions between firms and consumers, promising large efficiency gains. However, consumers have been slow to use these online technologies intensively, despite widespread adoption of the internet. Customers frequently undergo a staggered adoption process that may involve sign-up, experimentation, trial, and substantial usage until they fully embrace internet services. We ask whether delays in moving through the initial stages of this adoption process contribute to consumers ultimately not using the service intensively. Such behavior would be consistent with laboratory findings on consumer memory. We explore this question using data from a German retail bank where only 24% of the customers who sign up for the bank's online banking service use it substantially. We use exogenous variation in delays in the adoption process, caused by vacations and public holidays in different German states, to identify this effect. We find that delays in the early stages of adoption significantly reduce a customer's probability of moving to substantial usage: A 10-day delay of a customer's first online login reduces the likelihood that she will ever use the technology substantially, by 33%. This effect is more severe for demographic groups with less online experience. |
| Keywords: | patents, technology adoption, adoption process, online services, banking |
| JEL: | M3 M30 M31 L1 L16 L86 |
| Date: | 2006–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:net:wpaper:0740&r=ban |
| By: | Michael S. Gibson |
| Abstract: | The striking growth of credit derivatives suggests that market participants find them to be useful tools for risk management. I illustrate the value of credit derivatives with three examples. A commercial bank can use credit derivatives to manage the risk of its loan portfolio. An investment bank can use credit derivatives to manage the risks it incurs when underwriting securities. An investor, such as an insurance company, asset manager, or hedge fund, can use credit derivatives to align its credit risk exposure with its desired credit risk profile.> However, credit derivatives pose risk management challenges of their own. I discuss five of these challenges. Credit derivatives can transform credit risk in intricate ways that may not be easy to understand. They can create counterparty credit risk that itself must be managed. Complex credit derivatives rely on complex models, leading to model risk. Credit rating agencies interpret this complexity for investors, but their ratings can be misunderstood, creating rating agency risk. The settlement of a credit derivative contract following a default can have its own complications, creating settlement risk. For the credit derivatives market to continue its rapid growth, market participants must meet these risk management challenges. |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2007-47&r=ban |
| By: | Michele Bonollo; Davide Morandi; Chiara Pederzoli; Costanza Torricelli |
| Abstract: | The increasing use of internal market models for market risk assessment and management promotes, in compliance with Basel II, better risk management practices but introduces at the same time the so called model risk. In the light of the many open issues connected to market risk, the aim of this paper is twofold. First, it offers a formal analysis of model risk which is aimed to clarify quantification issues and to illustrate the architecture of a control process for this type of risk. An important building block of such an architecture is the so called market parameters control process, which is the focus of the present paper and consists of two different phases: the definition of the data sources and the data retrieval forms, and the definition of the techniques for valuing variables (i.e. input model data) based on market data. Second, this paper proposes a market parameters control process and its implementation within an important Italian bank, namely Gruppo Banco Popolare. Specifically, by focusing on equity market risk, this paper illustrates the whole organization process needed to set up and implement the market parameters control techniques, which imply first controlling for integrity (existence, domain, homogeneity) and outliers and then performing benchmarking activities. Special emphasis is placed on the so-called second level parameters, which do not have official quotes and still are fundamental especially in valuing non linear positions (e.g. volatility). These activities are based on mathematical-statistical models, whose implementation has required the development of specific software and IT solutions and the adoption of an articulate organizational structure. |
| Keywords: | model risk; market parameters; control process |
| JEL: | G21 C10 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mod:wcefin:07102&r=ban |
| By: | Brahima Coulibaly; Geng Li |
| Abstract: | This study revisits the empirical question of the determinants of the choice between fixed and adjustable-rate mortgages using more comprehensive data from the Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) that overcome some of the data limitations in previous studies. The results from a Logit model of mortgage choice indicate that pricing variables and affordability are important considerations. We also find that factors such as mobility expectations, income volatility, and attitudes toward financial risk largely influence mortgage choice, with more risk-averse borrowers preferring fixed-rate mortgages. For households that are less risk averse, the mortgage type choice decision is less sensitive to pricing variables and income volatility, and affordability factors are not significant. These findings provide empirical support that underscore the importance of attitudes toward risks in mortgage choice. |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2007-50&r=ban |
| By: | Charles J. Whalen |
| Abstract: | It is now clear that most economists underestimated the widening economic impact of the credit crunch that has shaken U.S. financial markets since at least mid-July. A credit crunch is an economic condition in which loans and investment capital are difficult to obtain. In such a period, banks and other lenders become wary of issuing loans, so the price of borrowing rises, often to the point where deals simply do not get done. Financial economist Hyman P. Minsky (1919–1996) was the foremost expert on such crunches, and his ideas remain relevant to understanding the current situation. This brief by Charles J. Whalen demonstrates that the U.S. credit crunch of 2007 can aptly be described as a “Minsky moment.” It begins by taking a look at aspects of this crunch, then examines the notion of a Minsky moment, along with the main ideas informing Minsky’s perspective on economic instability. At the heart of that viewpoint is what Minsky called the “financial instability hypothesis,” which derives from an interpretation of John Maynard Keynes’s work and underscores the value of an evolutionary and institutionally grounded alternative to conventional economics. The brief then returns to the 2007 credit crunch and identifies some of the key elements relevant to fleshing out a Minsky-oriented account of that event. |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:lev:levppb:ppb_92&r=ban |
| By: | Sharon Blei |
| Abstract: | Different financial systems vary in the way they contribute to the process of resource allocation in the economy and in the risk-sharing pattern that they bring about. It would therefore be plausible to expect different financial systems to differ in the way they affect real economic activity. I hereby provide a theoretic framework for the comparison and analysis of output cycles under two alternative financial systems: an equity-based financial system (EFS), in which a mutual fund functions as a financial intermediary, versus a debt-based financial system (DFS), in which a bank plays that role. The research points that DFS generates larger output cycles and a higher expected output than EFS. The mechanism that generates these results is the counter-cyclical effect of savings' behavior under EFS. |
| Keywords: | Financial markets ; Financial services industry |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedlsp:2007-04&r=ban |
| By: | Irina A. Telyukova; Randall Wright |
| Abstract: | Many individuals simultaneously have significant credit card debt and money in the bank. The credit card debt puzzle is: given high interest rates on credit cards and low rates on bank accounts, why not pay down debt? While some economists go to elaborate lengths to explain this, we argue it is a special case of the rate-of-return-dominance puzzle from monetary economics. We extend standard monetary theory to incorporate consumer debt, which is interesting in its own right since developing models where money and credit coexist is a long-standing challenge. Our model is quite tractable—e.g., it readily yields nice existence and characterization results—and helps puts into context recent discussions of consumer debt. |
| Keywords: | Credit cards ; Consumer credit |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedcwp:0711&r=ban |