Managing the risk of loan prepayments and the optimal structure of short term lending rates

Loan pricing is an extremely important aspect of bank operations because loans are typically over two-thirds of bank assets. Many researchers have analyzed the theoretical and empirical impact of how different factors should and do affect fixed rate loan rates and loan prepayments. However, a theoretical decision making model for maximizing expected profit in a declining rate environment has not been developed. After describing the conditions for the optimal loan rate, we develop numerical solutions for it under varying conditions. The varying conditions include the trend in interest rates, volatility of interest rates, and loan maturity. We thank Yen Low and Hamed Bagherpour for their assistance.