How have global financial institutions responded to the challenges of the post-crisis era?

The study examines the largely unexplored effect of changes in the competitive landscape for large, global financial institutions on their ability to take risks, as well as deploy capital and labour in an efficient manner based on a novel measure of inefficiency. The analysis shows during 2001–2013 that inefficiency peaked during the 2008 crisis period and has fallen back to levels close to pre-crisis periods. The model also performs well in out-of-sample forecasts of the financial firms’ future market values. These results suggest that large financial firms have been adjusting to the ‘new normal’ of the post-crisis period and thus are able to use capital and labour more efficiently within the constraints of current market conditions. In addition, a non-linear pattern between inefficiency and a firm’s asset size suggests that there might be an optimal scale for such firms in the $450–650 billion range.     

Financial Exposure and the International Transmission of Financial Shocks

This paper analyzes the transmission mechanism of banking sector shocks in an international real business cycle model with heterogeneous bank sizes. We examine to what extent the financial exposure of the banking sector affects the transmission of foreign banking sector shocks. In our model, the more exposed domestic banks are to the foreign economy via lending to foreign firms, the greater are the spillovers from foreign financial shocks to the home economy. The model highlights the role of openness to trade and the dynamics of the terms of trade in the international transmission mechanism of banking sector shocks: spillovers from foreign banking sector shocks are greater the more open the home economy is to trade and the less the terms of trade respond to foreign shocks.     

Intermediation for technology diffusion and user innovation in a developing rural economy: a social learning perspective

Technology intermediaries are seen as potent vehicles for addressing perennial problems in transferring technology from university to industry in developed and developing countries. This paper examines what constitutes effective user-end intermediation in a low-technology, developing economy context, which is an under-researched topic. The social learning in technological innovation framework is extended using situated learning theory in a longitudinal instrumental case study of an exemplar technology intermediation programme. The paper documents the role that academic-related research and advisory centres can play as intermediaries in brokering, facilitating and configuring technology, against the backdrop of a group of small-scale pisciculture businesses in a rural area of Colombia. In doing so, it demonstrates how technology intermediation activities can be optimized in the domestication and innofusion of technology amongst end-users. The design components featured in this instrumental case of intermediation can inform policy making and practice relating to technology transfer from university to rural industry. Future research on this subject should consider the intermediation components put forward, as well as the impact of such interventions, in different countries and industrial sectors. Such research would allow for theoretical replication and help improve technology domestication and innofusion in different contexts, especially in less-developed countries.     

存量视角下的中国金融中介比率测度:1992-2006年

对1992-2006年中国金融中介存量比率的实证分析发现,尽管非金融部门外部融资中银行信贷的高度垄断地位被逐渐削弱,但仍表现出高度依赖银行体系的贷款状况;而政府外部融资的来源则发生了结构性改变,市场中介融资已经成为政府融资最主要的来源,并由此导致金融中介在政府外部融资中的地位不降反升。此外,尽管非银行金融中介机构有了长足发展,但从相对资金融通的视角着眼,它还远远无法和银行抗衡。制约变迁约束下各部门经济行为的变化对融资机制有着重要影响。     

Financial intermediation and economic growth: the post-liberalization Indian experience

The paper is concerned with the relationship between economic growth and financial intermediation, in particular stock market development, in post-liberalization India. It identifies three possible relationships: (a) the relationship between growth of manufacturing and growth of the stock market; (b) the relationship between growth of the stock market and growth of traditional financial intermediaries like banks; (c) the relationship between the growth of the primary stock market and that of the secondary stock market. These three relationships are empirically tested using Indian data. While the growth of turnover in the stock market is found to be positively correlated with the change in the growth of manufacturing and the growth of sales of new shares is found to positively affect the secondary market, evidence on the relationship between sales of new shares and traditional banking activities is mixed. The primary stock market is found to crowd out bank deposits, but crowd in bank credit.     

Does Financial Intermediation Development Increase Per Capita Income in Rural China？

This paper investigates the impacts of financial intermediary （or banking） development on village-level per capita income using a Chinese dataset for selected years between 1993 and 2006. The empirical results from a random effect regression model indicate that mean per capita income in rural villages follows an inverted U-shaped path as financial intermediation develops. However, using a pooled quantile regression approach, we find that median per capita income in rural villages follows a positive linear path, rather than an inverted U-shaped path, as financial intermediation develops. The positive linear effect of financial intermediary development is observed at the lower and higher ends of the conditional per capita income distribution. This suggests that development of financial intermediation in China might not have statistically significant differential effects in low-income or high-income rural villages.     

The societal benefit of a financial transaction tax

We provide a novel justification for a financial transaction tax for economies where agents face stochastic consumption opportunities. A financial transaction tax makes it more costly for agents to readjust their portfolios of liquid and illiquid assets in response to liquidity shocks, which increase both the demand for and the price of liquid assets. The higher price improves liquidity insurance and welfare for other market participants. We calibrate the model to U.S. data and find that the optimal financial transaction tax is 1.6% and that it reduces the volume of financial trading by 17%.     

Buying a house and the decision to use a real estate broker

This study examines the factors that affect the decision by home buyers to use real estate brokers and the subsequent effect this decision has on home prices. Buyers with high opportunity costs and the least amount of information about local market conditions are the most likely to use brokers; a finding consistent with the role of the real estate broker as a market intermediary. Not surprisingly, these were some of the same factors that also have a positive impact on selling price. An important finding of this study is that when selection bias is adequately controlled, the real estate broker has no appreciable, independent impact on selling price. This, in turn, suggests a nonsegmented, highly competitive housing market.     

Benefits to Homeowners from Mortgage Portfolios Retained by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

Mortgage investing is the domain of financial intermediaries, such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, who possess specialized knowledge and experienced analytic teams. Capital is channeled to homeowner/borrowers at lower cost through such entities. As the demand for mortgage borrowing outstrips aggregate domestic saving (which is currently negative) foreign sources of capital should become even more significant. Foreign capital can be channeled efficiently into the U.S. mortgage market by Fannie and Freddie. Their debt has the highest credit standing and their risk management ability has been demonstrated by their enormous retained portfolios of mortgages.     

Joint liability among bank borrowers

Summary. A common feature of financial intermediaries is that the welfare of one borrower is adversely affected by the poor performance of other borrowers. That is, there exists a degree of joint liability among the borrowers of a financial intermediary. This paper provides an explanation for this observation. It demonstrates that in Krasa and Villamil's [14] formalization of a financial intermediary as a delegated monitor, intermediation with joint liability between borrowers Pareto dominates intermediation without joint liability.Received: 4 September 2002, Revised: 21 March 2003, JEL Classification Numbers: D8, E5, G2, G3.I am particularly indebted to Douglas Diamond and Robert Townsend for their advice on this paper. I thank an anonymous referee for helpful comments.