Liquidation Value and Loan Pricing

This paper shows that the liquidation value of collateral depends on the interdependency between borrower and collateral risk. Using transaction-level data on short-term repurchase agreements (repo), we show that borrowers pay a premium of 1.1 to 2.6 basis points when their default risk is positively correlated with the risk of the collateral that they pledge. Moreover, we show that borrowers internalize this premium when making their collateral choices. Loan-level credit registry data suggest that the results extend to the corporate loan market as well.     

The Role of Collateral in the Credit Acquisition Process: Evidence from SME Lending

This study tests the simultaneous impact of observed characteristics and private information on debt term contracts in a multi‐period setting, using a dataset of 12,666 credit approvals by one major Portuguese commercial bank during 2007–2010. The main results show that borrowers with good credit scores that know they have a high probability of success and are unlikely to default are more willing to pledge collateral in return for a lower interest rate premium (IRP). Furthermore, lenders tailor the specific terms of the contract, increasing both collateral requirements and the IRP from observed risk, for borrowers operating in riskier industries and with less credit availability. The results are robust to controls for joint debt terms negotiation and the degree of collateralization offered by the borrower.     

Lending relationships in line-of-credit and nonline-of-credit loans: Evidence from collateral use in small business

Lender–borrower relationships facilitate monitoring in small business loans. We investigate how the duration and scope of the bank–borrower relationship affect the decision to secure line-of-credit and nonline-of-credit loans. We find that the likelihood of collateralizing a line of credit decreases with the length of the bank–borrower relationship. For nonline-of-credit loans, however, the incidence of collateral pledge decreases with the number of lender-provided financial services used by the borrower. Our finding indicates that the mechanism through which banks obtain private information depends on the type of the loan. Pooling across loan types may dilute the impact of both the duration and scope on the terms of a loan.     

CEO overconfidence and bank loan contracting

In this paper, we examine the effect of managerial overconfidence on bank loan spreads. Our theoretical model and empirical results support that firms with highly overconfident CEOs have lower loan spreads and that the reducing effect of these CEOs on the spread is more pronounced when the loan contracts have collateral or covenants. Unlike firms with highly overconfident CEOs, firms with moderately overconfident CEOs do not receive lower loan spreads. We perform various tests to alleviate the concerns about endogeneity, and the results are robust. The results are consistent with the idea that highly overconfident CEOs are more willing to pledge collateral and accept covenants in exchange for a reduction in their loan rate.     

Role of Collateral and Personal Guarantees in Relationship Lending: Evidence from Japan's SME Loan Market

This paper investigates the determinants of the use of collateral and personal guarantees in Japan's SME loan market. We find that firms' riskiness does not have a significant effect on the likelihood that collateral is used. We find, however, that main banks whose claims are collateralized monitor borrowers more intensively and that borrowers who have a long-term relationship with their main banks are more likely to pledge collateral. These findings are consistent with the theory that the use of collateral is effective in raising the bank's seniority and enhances its screening and monitoring. This incentive effect for the bank becomes tenuous for personal guarantees.     

Evidence of jointness in the terms of relationship lending

This paper examines the impact of the borrower–lender relationship on the explicit loan interest rate and collateral, as well as the correlation between loan interest rates and collateral. Using a simultaneous equation approach, we find that collateral has a statistically significant positive impact of 200 to 400 basis points on loan interest rates. We find this positive association to be stronger for personal (or outside) collateral than collateral provided by the firm's assets (or inside collateral). Finally, we find the economic impact of the borrower–lender relationship to be 21 basis points for one standard deviation increase in relationship length.     

声誉机制、信任机制与小额信贷

小额信贷之所以在不需要抵押担保的情况下也能为借款者放款,究其原因,除了贷款者所实施的信贷规范起到了降低风险的作用以外,建立在"声誉效应"基础上的信任机制作用的发挥起到了关键性的作用,如果借贷双方以及借款联保小组成员间缺乏基本的信任,那么合作行为是不会出现的.本文对建立在声誉效应基础上的信任机制所发挥的作用进行动态博弈分析,在此基础上根据实地调研的数据进行实证剖析,提出了通过借贷双方长期博弈建立信任关系、不断投入资源以维护信任机制、发挥农业保险与专业组织的作用降低农户经营风险等政策建议.     

The Informational Role of the Media in Private Lending

We investigate whether a borrower's media coverage influences the syndicated loan origination and participation decisions of informationally disadvantaged lenders, loan syndicate structures, and interest spreads. In syndicated loan deals, information asymmetries can exist between lenders that have a relationship with a borrower and less informed, nonrelationship lenders competing to serve as lead arranger on a syndicated loan, and also between lead arrangers and less informed syndicate participants. Theory suggests that the aggressiveness with which less informed lenders compete for a loan deal increases in the sentiment of public information signals about a borrower. We extend this theory to syndicated loans and hypothesize that the likelihood of less informed lenders serving as the lead arranger or joining a loan syndicate is increasing in the sentiment of media‐initiated, borrower‐specific articles published prior to loan origination. We find that as media sentiment increases (1) outside, nonrelationship lenders have a higher probability of originating loans; (2) syndicate participants are less likely to have a previous relationship with the borrower or lead bank; (3) lead banks retain a lower percentage of loans; and (4) loan spreads decrease.     

Tests of ex ante versus ex post theories of collateral using private and public information

Collateral is a widely used, but not well understood, debt contracting feature. Two broad strands of theoretical literature explain collateral as arising from the existence of either ex ante private information or ex post incentive problems between borrowers and lenders. However, the extant empirical literature has been unable to isolate each of these effects. This paper attempts to do so using a credit registry that is unique in that it allows the researcher to have access to some private information about borrower risk that is unobserved by the lender. The data also include public information about borrower risk, loan contract terms, and ex post performance for both secured and unsecured loans. The results suggest that the ex post theories of collateral are empirically dominant, although the ex ante theories are also valid for customers with short borrower–lender relations that are relatively unknown to the lender.     

Forbearance and Prompt Corrective Action

This article investigates whether a bank regulator should terminate problem banks promptly or exercise forbearance. We construct a dynamic model economy in which entrepreneurs pledge collateral, borrow from banks, and invest in long-term projects. We assume that collateral value has aggregate risk over time, that in any period entrepreneurs can abscond with the projects but lose the collateral, and that depositors can withdraw deposits. We show that optimal regulation exhibits forbearance if the ex-ante probability of collapse in collateral value is sufficiently low, but exhibits prompt termination of problem banks if this probability is sufficiently high.     

Determinants of the incidence of U.S. Mortgage Loan Modifications

This paper combines data on the performance of mortgage loans with detailed borrower, neighborhood, and property characteristics to examine the factors that determine the outcomes of seriously delinquent loans. We employ multinomial logit models in a hazard framework to explain how loan, borrower, property, servicer and neighborhood characteristics affect which of the following four outcomes results from a seriously delinquent loan: (1) the borrower cures the delinquency; (2) the borrower and lender agree to modify the loan; (3) the borrower suffers a liquidation (short sale, deed in lieu, foreclosure auction sale or REO); or (4) the loan remains delinquent. In particular, we focus on mortgage modification. We find that the outcomes of delinquent loans are significantly related to: current LTV, FICO scores, especially risky loan characteristics, the servicer of the loan, neighborhood housing price appreciation, and whether the borrower received foreclosure counseling.     

Does debtor protection really protect debtors? Evidence from the small business credit market

This paper analyzes how different levels of debtor protection across US states affect small firms’ access to credit, as well as the price and non-price terms of their loans. We use an individual-specific measure of debtor protection that has its maximum value when the borrower’s home equity is lower than the state homestead exemption (the debtor’s home equity is fully protected), and is decreasing in the difference between the home equity and the homestead exemption (the amount that the creditor can seize). We find that unlimited liability small businesses have lower access to credit in states with more debtor-friendly bankruptcy laws. In addition, these businesses face tighter loan terms - they are more likely to pledge business collateral, have shorter maturities, and borrow smaller amounts. For limited liability small businesses, we also find a reduction in credit availability, but of smaller magnitude, together with an increase in the loan rate.     

Collateral and its substitutes in emerging markets’ lending

Due to opaque information and weak enforcement in emerging loan markets, the need for collateral is high, whereas borrowers lack adequate assets to pledge as collateral. How is this puzzle solved? We find for a representative sample from Northeast Thailand that indeed most loans do not include any tangible assets as collateral. Instead, lenders enforce collateral-free loans through third-party guarantees and relationship lending, but also through modifying loan terms, such as reducing loan size. Guarantees are the relatively most important substitute, they reduce collateral requirements independently of relationship lending and they are more often used by formal financial institutions.     

Financial Statements as Monitoring Mechanisms: Evidence from Small Commercial Loans

Using a data set that records banks’ ongoing requests of information from small commercial borrowers, we examine when banks use financial statements to monitor borrowers after loan origination. We find that banks request financial statements for half the loans and this variation is related to borrower credit risk, relationship length, collateral, and the provision of business tax returns, but in complex ways. The relation between borrower risk and financial statement requests has an inverted U‐shape; and tax returns can be both substitutes and complements to financial statements, conditional on borrower characteristics and the degree of bank–borrower information asymmetry. Frequent financial reporting is used to monitor collateral, but only for non–real estate loans and only when the collateral is easily accessible to lenders. Collectively, our results provide novel evidence of a fundamental information demand for financial reporting in monitoring small commercial borrowers and a specific channel through which banks fulfill their role as delegated monitors.     

Recovery rates of commercial lending: Empirical evidence for German companies

There are very few studies concerning the recovery rate of bank loans. Prediction models of recovery rates are increasing in importance because of the Basel II-framework, the impact on credit risk management, and the calculation of loan rates. In this study, we focus the analyses on the distribution of recovery rates and the impact of the quota of collateral, the creditworthiness of the borrower, the size of the company and the intensity of the client relationship on the recovery rate. All our hypotheses can be confirmed. A higher quota of collateral leads to a higher recovery rate, whereas the risk premium of the borrower and the size of the company is negatively related to the recovery rate. Borrowers with an intense client relationship with the bank exhibit a higher recovery rate.     

The Pricing of Sequential Bank Loans

The theory of financial intermediation assigns banks a unique role in the resolution of information asymmetry. Banks, in general, obtain private information about the borrower and the project during the screening of loan applicants and during the monitoring of loan recipients. Incumbent banks, in particular, utilize information obtained while monitoring previous loan extensions to resolve information asymmetry when granting subsequent loans. We examine the rate on a sequence of loans to a borrower and find that the incumbent bank information advantage has finite magnitude and is quickly reflected in the pricing of the second loan. We also find that the lending relationship does not deteriorate to the detriment of the borrower. This study also provides further evidence supporting the hypothesis that an incumbent bank resolves information asymmetry during the monitoring of loan extensions.     

So what do I get? The bank's view of lending relationships

While many empirical studies document borrower benefits of lending relationships, less is known about lender benefits. A relationship lender's informational advantage over a non-relationship lender may generate a higher probability of selling information-sensitive products to its borrowers. Our results show that the probability of a relationship lender providing a future loan is 42%, while for a non-relationship lender, this probability is 3%. Consistent with theory, we find that borrowers with greater information asymmetries are significantly likely to obtain future loans from their relationship lenders. Relationship lenders are likely to be chosen to provide debt/equity underwriting services, but this effect is economically small.     

Does collateral fuel moral hazard in banking?

This paper presents two models in which the fluctuating value of loan collateral (real estate) generates the problem of moral hazard between a bank and a deposit insurance agent. The bank finances risky projects against collateral and relies on the rising collateral value. If the collateral value later appreciates, the bank enjoys handsome profits; otherwise, the bank fails. The findings are rather consistent with the characteristics of the topical subprime mortgage crisis.     

Optimal Loan Interest Rate Contract Design

This paper analyzes optimal loan interest rate contracts under conditions of risky, symmetric information for one-period (static) and multi-period (dynamic) models. The optimal loan interest rate depends upon the volatility of, and co-variation among the market interest rate, borrower collateral, and borrower income, as well as the time horizon and the risk preferences of lenders and borrowers. For a risk-averse borrower with stochastic collateral, variable interest rate contracts are, in general, Pareto optimal. For plausible assumptions, the optimal loan interest rate for the multi-period model often exhibits muted responses to changes in market interest rates, making fixed rate loans a reasonable approximation for the optimal loan. Hence, in the absence of optimal contracts, long-term (short-term) borrowers tend to prefer fixed rate (variable) contracts.     

Strategic loan defaults and coordination: An experimental analysis

This paper experimentally studies the impact of bank and borrower fundamentals on loan repayment. We find that solvent borrowers are more likely to default strategically when the bank’s expected strength is low, although loan repayment is a Pareto dominant Nash equilibrium. Borrowers are also less likely to repay when other borrowers’ expected repayment capacity is low, regardless of banks’ fundamentals. We show that changes in expectations about bank and borrower fundamentals change the risk dominance properties of the borrowers’ coordination problem, and that these changes subsequently explain strategic defaults. For the individual borrower, loss aversion and negative past experiences reduce repayment, suggesting that bank failure can be contagious in times of distress.