COVID-19 and A-share banks' stock price volatility: From the perspective of the epidemic evolution in China and the US

With a financial market dominated by indirect financing, China's banking system played a critical role in the government's response to COVID-19, which piqued our interest in the short-term impact of COVID-19 on the risk of China's banks. Examining the stock price of A-share listed banks and the number of confirmed cases in China and the US during the short time window surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic's outbreak, this study reveals that COVID-19 increased the A-share banking price volatility in both China and the US, reflecting a strong spillover effect of the US economic and financial system. Furthermore, COVID-19 in China has a smaller impact on the stock price volatility of China's state-owned banks (SOBs) than that of medium- and small-sized (M&S) banks, reflecting the higher risk resistance capability of large SOBs. Further analysis confirms that the impact primarily reflected systematic risk rather than idiosyncratic risk, as small and micro enterprises and M&S banks received more targeted financial support from the government. In contrast, large banks took on more responsibilities in the emergency financial stimulus, narrowing the idiosyncratic risk gap between the two types of banks and allowing the banking industry to better play its core role in the recovery of real economy in China. These findings will assist us in better understanding the effectiveness of financial assistance policies during the epidemic and will provide insights for future policymaking during similar crises.     

商业银行的行业特征与管理报酬

本文在综述了国内外相关研究的基础上认为,银行业的行业特征对管理报酬有显著影响:高负债率导致的风险转移要求商业银行使用较低的管理激励;低增长性和波动性一定程度上解释了银行业较低的报酬-绩效敏感性,但是这一点随着银行业投资机会的增加在发生根本性变化;不透明性意味着管理报酬更多地基于股票而不是会计的绩效测度;相似的生产技术表明较少的公司专有人力资本激励;银行监管则通过影响银行业市场结构、激励成本和资本监管从而在根本上影响管理报酬结构。     

The Effect of Bank Debt Downgrades on Stock Prices of Other Banks

We find that debt downgrades of money center banks elicit negative stock price responses in nondowngraded money center banks. Stock prices of larger regional banks also react to these downgrades. Although downgrades of regional banks evoke negative stock price responses for regional banks in the same geographic region, the importance of geographic region as a factor determining the extent of intra‐industry reactions has diminished since 1989. Our results indicate that the merger and expansion activities triggered by interstate banking have blurred differences between regional and money center banks as interstate banking activity has moved towards nationwide banking     

Is bank default risk systematic?

We evaluate the impact of commonly used indicators of bank distress on broad (i.e. sector and country) risks. This issue deserves special attention in the banking industry where there is a strong degree of interconnectedness among institutions and the default of a single bank may cause a cascading failure, which could potentially bankrupt the entire system. Using several measures of individual bank risk our results show that these measures have a direct impact on European banking (i.e. systemic) stock market risk. We also provide strong evidence suggesting that, for listed banks, default risk tends to be systematic (i.e. non-diversifiable).     

Has the uniformity of banking regulation within the European Union restricted rather than encouraged sectoral development?

The recent international financial crisis exposed many of the frailties that exist within the European banking sector. One major decision taken by the European Commission was to transition the powers of the Committee of European Banking Supervisors to that of the European Banking Authority (EBA). Our analysis focuses primarily on the differing behaviour by each European country's banking sector to major shocks, namely that in the form of bank closures. It is then necessary to investigate and further understand the role that the European Banking Authority now possesses with regards to releasing sensitive announcements based on the underlying currents of the European Banking system as measured by domestic banking sector stock returns. Finally, we investigate the cultural characteristics that can be uncovered by analysing the responses of domestic banking sectors to uniform regulation. We present three key findings. First, European countries with more local banking networks in the form of credit unions, public banks or savings banks, generate greater levels of volatility when compared to that of their commercial counterparts, particularly in countries with more monopolistic sectors. Secondly, the announcements of the European Banking Authority generate significant volatility effects for the European banking sector at large, with particular emphasis on stress testing results, but also announcements based on recapitalisation, regulation and transparency. Finally, cultural distance effects are identified, indicating that peripheral states are experiencing more substantial volatility effects to European Banking Authority decisions. These results indicate that uniformity of regulation may in fact be hindering and restricting the growth of some domestic and more peripheral and locally designed banking sectors in the form of rules designed for commercial banking operations.     

Swiss banking secrecy: the stock market evidence

We examine the stock price reactions of four Swiss banks to negotiations between Switzerland and the European Union and between Switzerland and the United States to (i) obtain an estimate of the value of banking secrecy to Swiss banks, and (ii) distinguish between tax evasion and genuine privacy concerns as sources of that value. We find that the value of banking secrecy to the private banks is large, accounting for 8 to 14% of their market value; in contrast, the value of banking secrecy to the universal banks is small. We further find that tax evasion may be less important and privacy concerns more important a source of value of banking secrecy than might previously have been thought.     

股票价格波动对银行稳定影响的理论及经验分析

商业银行直接或间接地参与股票市场,就会因股票价格的波动影响银行资产质量进而影响银行资产负债表和银行稳定。理论和实践证明股票价格的急剧波动和银行部门不稳定性扩散之间存在紧密的联系;同时,银行信贷的扩张对股票价格的波动有很大影响。对我国的经验分析表明:银行间信贷市场与股票市场的资金连通存在较强的相关性;上市银行脆弱度与上证综合指数的相关性在5%水平上显著。在综合经营的大背景下,应加强对我国金融脆弱性的识别和监管,疏通货币市场与股票市场正常的资金联系,加强对商业银行的审慎管理,银行自身也要加强风险管理。     

The market reaction to bank regulatory reports

We investigate the role of bank regulatory reports in the information environments of banks. Our findings are as follows. (1) Call Reports but not FR Y-9Cs elicit economically significant stock price and volume reactions when they are publicly released, despite the fact that Call Reports usually follow earnings announcements. (2) Some of the reaction is traceable to a schedule dealing with mortgage lending and servicing. (3) The release of the Call Reports is tightly clustered around the 30th day after quarter-end. (4) After bank regulators undertook a “modernization project” to speed the processing and public dissemination of regulatory reports, the banking industry routinely experiences abnormal stock price volatility and trading volume on the 30th day of the quarter. (5) The market reaction increased after media coverage of this study. Our findings are of interest to regulators who require and monitor the reports, banks that prepare the reports, investors who may use the reports, and academics who can base research designs on the timing patterns we uncover.     

Revisiting the merger and acquisition performance of European banks

The study examines the value creation of Merger and Acquisition (M&A) deals in European banking from 1990 to 2004. This is performed, first, by examining the stock price reaction of banks to the announcement of M&A deals and, second, by analysing the determinants of this reaction. The findings provide evidence of value creation in European banks as the shareholders of the targets have benefited from positive and (statistically) significant abnormal returns while those of the acquirers earn small negative but non-significant abnormal returns. In the case of the shareholders of the acquirers, domestic M&As and especially those between banks with shares listed on the stock market, seem to be more beneficial compared to cross-border ones or those when the target is unlisted. Shareholders of the targets earn in all cases positive abnormal returns. Finally, although the link between abnormal returns and fundamental characteristics of the banks is rather weak, it appears that the acquisition of smaller, less efficient banks generating more diversified income is more value creating, while acquisition of less efficient, liquid and characterised by higher credit risk banks is not a value creating option.     

Banking industry volatility and economic growth

Utilizing the recent dynamic panel GMM estimation techniques for 36 markets, this research investigates the relationship between banking industry volatility and future economic growth, and provides empirical evidence complementary to Cole et al. (2008) who examine the finance-growth nexus from a unique asset pricing theory perspective and document a positive relationship between bank stock returns and future economic growth that is significantly influenced by a series of country-specific and banking institutional characteristics. We find that the negative link between banking industry volatility and future economic growth is significantly affected by government ownership of banks, the enforcement of the insider trading law, systemic banking crises, and bank accounting disclosure standards, while the impact of financial development is ambiguous. The significant results are primarily driven by the data from emerging markets.     

Banking industry volatility and banking crises

While studies using balance sheet information of banks and macroeconomic indicators to forecast banking crises are prolific, empirical research using market information of banks is relatively sparse. We investigate whether banking industry volatility, constructed with the disaggregated approach from Campbell et al. [Campbell, J.Y., Lettau, M., Malkiel, B.G., Xu, Y., 2001. Have individual stocks become more volatile? An empirical exploration of idiosyncratic risk? The Journal of Finance 56, 1–43] using exclusively publicly available market information of banks, is a good predictor of systemic banking crises in the analyses including data from 18 developed and 18 emerging markets. We find that banking industry volatility performs well in predicting systemic banking crises for developed markets but very poor for emerging markets, which suggest that the impact of market forces on the soundness of the banking system might be different for developed and emerging markets. We also find that those macroeconomic and banking risk management indicators have different impact on the probability of banking crises. Therefore, the traditional cross-country results of the studies on banking crises need to be interpreted cautiously.     

R&D Progress, stock price volatility, and post-announcement drift: An empirical investigation into biotech firms

I investigate the effects of R&D progress on the dynamics of stock price volatility and the post announcement drift to provide insights into whether or not and how capital markets react to corporate R&D progress in the context of the biotech industry. I find both stock price volatility and the post announcement drift decrease in R&D progress. More importantly, the decrease is proportional to the increase in the drug development success rate driven by R&D progress. Findings suggest that R&D progress conveys useful risk-relevant information, and plays an important role in explaining stock price volatility change and market anomalies.     

European Banking Integration: Don’t Put the Cart before the Horse

This paper reviews the progress in European banking integration over the last twenty years, and evaluates the current system of banking supervision and deposit insurance based on ‘home country’ control. The public policy implications to draw from the paper are threefold: First, after a relatively slow start, European banking integration is gaining momentum, in terms of cross‐border flows, market share of foreign banks in several domestic markets, and cross‐border M&As of significant size. If this trend continues, the issue of adequate supervision and safety nets in an integrated European banking market will become even more pressing. Second, although until recently banks have relied mostly on subsidiary structures to go cross‐border, this is changing with the recent creation of the European company statute, which facilitates cross‐border branch banking. A review of the case of the Scandinavian bank, Nordea Bank AB, helps to understand some remaining barriers to integration, and the supervisory issues raised by branch banking. Third, it is argued that the principle of ‘home country’ supervision is unlikely to be adequate in the future for large international banks. Because the closure of an international bank would be likely to have cross‐border spillovers, and because some small European countries might be unable to finance the bail‐out of their very large banks, centralization, or at least Europe‐wide coordination, of the decision to close or bail‐out international banks is needed. This raises the issue of European funding of bail‐out costs, European banking supervision, and European deposit insurance.     

银行价格竞争、融资约束与企业研发投资——基于“中介效应”模型的实证研究

近年来我国利率市场化改革积极推进,实体经济发展积极向创新驱动转型,一个亟须研究厘清的关键问题是,银行业竞争如何驱动企业创新活动？本文关注银行价格竞争对企业创新的影响,以2013—2018年沪深两市的上市企业为样本,采用“中介效应”因果分析模型,实证检验了银行价格竞争对企业研发投资的影响,并识别出以融资约束为中介渠道的作用机制。研究发现,银行价格竞争不仅会提高银行的风险容忍度,直接增加R&D投资的信贷供给意愿,而且还会通过降低贷款价格和增加贷款可得性来缓解企业整体的融资约束,间接促进企业创新活动。这一机制在解除贷款利率管制之后以及在民营企业层面体现得更加明显。本文的研究结果对于深化金融市场化改革、改善金融服务实体经济效果以及实施经济创新驱动发展战略,具有明确的政策启示。     

机构投资者影响我国股价波动的实证研究

采用 TGARCH 模型对机构投资者与我国股指波动的关系进行研究,实证结果表明：无论是否考虑宏观经济因素对股票市场的影响,机构投资者对我国股票市场波动均产生正向影响。进一步用面板数据模型对机构投资者与上市公司股价波动的关系进行研究,发现机构投资者在不同宏观经济环境下也均未起到稳定上市公司股价波动的作用。     

商业银行行业风险敞口与商业银行绩效

商业银行的行业风险敞口与商业银行绩效密切相关。中国数据实证分析表明,银行财务报表中会计占比较大的行业并非是市场认为的银行风险敞口最大的行业;股份制商业银行对各行业风险敞口较高。整体上商业银行对各行业的风险敞口对商业银行股票波动率、收益率和市值与账面价值之比具有显著影响,但行业风险敞口对银行系统性风险贡献度的影响不显著。     

Stale Information,Shocks, and Volatility

We propose a new approach to measuring the effect of unobservable private information on volatility. Using intraday data, we estimate the effect of a well‐identified shock on the volatility of stock returns of European banks as a function of the quality of public information available about the banks. We hypothesize that as publicly available information becomes stale, volatility effects and its persistence increase, as private information of investors becomes more important. We find strong support for this idea in the data. We further show that stock volatility is higher just before important announcements if information is stale.     

我国上市银行利差决定因素分析

本文对国内2000～2009年间上市银行利差率的决定因素按照银行经营的安全、效率和盈利指标,结合行业和宏观经济状况等因素进行了实证分析。结论表明,虽然股份制上市银行经营状况普遍优于国有银行,但其经营行为可能会部分抵消央行的利率政策,同时股票市场发展对银行经营没有显著性影响。     

Market reactions to policy deliberations on fair value accounting and impairment rules during the financial crisis of 2008–2009

Fair value accounting (FVA) has been blamed for amplifying the financial crisis of 2008–2009. We investigate investor and creditor reactions to policymaker deliberations, recommendations and decisions about FVA and impairment rules in the banking industry. If FVA was a key contributor to the financial crisis as some industry pundits and academic research suggest, we first should observe positive stock market reactions to proposals that relax FVA rules and negative reactions when policymakers support FVA. Second, we investigate cross-sectional stock price reactions to bank-specific factors that potentially contributed to pro-cyclical contagion. Third, we examine whether banks that have fewer alternative sources of information about fair values experience relatively negative reactions to potential relaxation of FVA and impairment rules. Finally, we investigate credit market reactions to these policy deliberations, recommendations and decisions by examining changes in credit default swap spreads for a subset of banks in our sample.     

The Volatility of European Banking Systems: A Two-Decade Study

This paper examines the trends and composition of volatility across European banking systems from January 1988 to December 2010. While there is no evidence of a long-term trend in the average level of banking system volatility, there is a change in its composition resulting from the growing importance of International and European nonfinancial components, especially in the largest banking systems. We argue that the changing composition of banking system volatility is the effect of a long-term integration process (with a growing importance of cross-border activities) that has not been influenced by the introduction of the Euro. Our results highlight the increasing vulnerability of the European banking systems to International and European shocks and an increasing likelihood of cross-border banking crises, and the need for regulatory reforms that focus on effective cross-border crisis management and resolution so as to safeguard the systemic stability of European banking in the near future.