Payday Loan Choices and Consequences

High‐cost consumer credit has proliferated in the past two decades, raising regulatory scrutiny. We match administrative data from a payday lender with nationally representative credit bureau files to examine the choices of payday loan applicants and assess whether payday loans help or harm borrowers. We find consumers apply for payday loans when they have limited access to mainstream credit. In addition, the weakness of payday applicants’ credit histories is severe and longstanding. Based on regression discontinuity estimates, we show that the effects of payday borrowing on credit scores and other measures of financial well‐being are close to zero. We test the robustness of these null effects to many factors, including features of the local market structure.     

How (not) to pay for advice: A framework for consumer financial protection

This paper investigates the determinants of the compensation structure for brokers who advise customers regarding the suitability of financial products. Our model explains why brokers are commonly compensated indirectly through contingent commissions paid by product providers, even though this compensation structure could lead to biased advice. When customers are wary of the adviser's incentives, contingent commissions can be an effective incentive tool to induce the adviser to learn which specialized product is most suitable for the specific needs of customers. If, instead, customers naively believe they receive unbiased advice, high product prices and correspondingly high commissions become a tool of exploitation. Policy intervention that mandates disclosure of commissions can protect naive consumers and increase welfare. However, prohibiting or capping commissions could have the unintended consequence of stifling the adviser's incentive to acquire information. More vigorous competition benefits consumers and reduces exploitation, but firms have limited incentives to educate naive customers.     

国外金融消费权益保护改革进展及启示

加强金融消费权益保护成为危机后国际金融监管改革的重要共识。文章分别以美国、欧盟、英国和日本为代表介绍了国外金融消费权益保护改革取得的进展,在借鉴国外金融消费权益保护改革举措和发展方向的基础上,就完善我国金融消费权益保护工作提出相关建议。     

Internet,consumer spending,and credit card balance: Evidence from US consumers

Utilizing the 2013 Survey of Consumer Finances data, the present study aims to examine the role of the Internet in carrying a credit card balance among US households. The central question of this study is whether or not households with Internet access have more favorable attitudes toward incurring more credit card balance. This study further investigates whether education, income, gender, age, race, etc., make any differences in carrying credit card debt when households have access to the Internet. Our results with the Tobit model show that having access to the Internet increases the probability of carrying a positive credit card balance by 4% to 5% compared to those who do not have access to the Internet. This result does not apply to older Americans. Our results further indicate that education decreases the probability of carrying a positive credit balance for households that have access to the Internet, while income and liquid assets may have little positive effect on that probability. The results suggest that Internet leads to more debt, but education could alleviate that debt.     

Minimum payments and debt paydown in consumer credit cards

Using a data set covering one quarter of the U.S. general-purpose credit card market, we document that 29% of accounts regularly make payments at or near the minimum payment. To explain the prevalence of low payment amounts, we exploit changes in issuers’ minimum payment formulas to quantify the explanatory power of two potential theories: liquidity constraints and anchoring. At least 22% of near-minimum payers (and 9% of all accounts) respond to the formula changes in a manner consistent with anchoring as opposed to liquidity constraints alone. Our results show that anchoring to a salient contractual term has a significant impact on household repayment decisions.     

Social and solidarity finance: A conceptual approach

An analysis of the social- and solidarity-finance system of relationships, which has characteristics that differ from those of other financial intermediaries, underpins the conceptual approach of this article. Social and solidarity finance constitutes a set of interdependent financial and social relationships, and partnerships between individuals and organisations, that mesh into an organised whole.This article makes use of institutional economics to understand those mechanisms of interaction between individuals, organisations and institutions that are not strictly economic. First, we offer a new conceptual framework on social and solidarity finance from an institutional point of view. Then, based on this framework, we outline the sustainability of alternative finance and its ability to respond to specific entrepreneurship needs. Finally, we present the French situation regarding social and solidarity finance to highlight the main characteristics of alternative finance.     

Financial literacy and portfolio diversification

We use a survey of individual investors disclosed by the Portuguese Securities Commission (CMVM) in May 2005 to study the impact of investors’ levels of financial literacy on portfolio diversification. We consider distinct aspects of financial literacy, and control for socioeconomic and behavioral differences among individual groups of investors. Our results suggest that investors’ educational levels and their financial knowledge have a positive impact on investor diversification. The information sources used by retail investors to gather information on markets and financial products also have a significant impact on the number of different assets included in a portfolio.     

离岸金融市场及其在中国的发展

离岸金融是20世纪50年代金融自由化浪潮中出现的重大金融创新。该文从追溯离岸金融市场的发展历史入手,概括了离岸金融的含义、特点,探讨了离岸金融市场出现和发展的原因,分析了离岸金融市场对于全球经济金融形势的影响以及发展前景,并就中国如何利用离岸金融发展中国的金融市场、扩展中国的金融实力、增强人民币的国际地位进行了初步探讨。     

Anomalies in finance: What are they and what are they good for?

In the natural sciences, anomalies contribute significantly to the development of new and ultimately more successful theories. The role of anomalies in financial economics, however, has been quite different. Although at the beginning, the word was used to show deviations from the Efficient Markets Hypothesis (EMH)/Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) paradigm, lately, it has been applied to a new literature that is also more accurately called Behavioral Finance (BF). This paper argues that this misuse and misapplication of the word anomaly is not a simple coincidence. It is rather a sophisticated and accordant effort to imply that although there are some unresolved deviations from the norm, the reigning paradigm is irreplaceable, and its validity needs no empirical proof. In fact, an alternative paradigm such as BF is not only insignificant but also unnecessary and even impossible.     

Bank soundness and bank lending to new firms during the global financial crisis

This paper examines how the soundness of financial institutions affected bank lending to new firms during the 2008 financial crisis by using a unique firm–bank match‐level dataset of 1,467 unlisted small and medium‐sized enterprises incorporated in Japan. We employ a within‐firm estimator that can control for unobserved firms’ demand for credit through firm ? time fixed effects. The major findings of this paper are the following four points. First, sounder financial institutions may be generally less likely to provide financing to new firms. Second, our results suggest that sounder financial institutions were less likely to provide loans to new firms during the 2008 financial crisis. Third, financial institutions were less likely to provide financing to new firms during such crisis as compared to those with the same soundness during non‐crisis periods. Finally, such lending relationships to new firms that are established during the financial crisis by sounder financial institutions are more likely to be continued than such lending by less sound financial institutions.     

Financial inclusion,financial inclusion policy and Islamic finance

Using a qualitative analysis, the paper examines the links between financial inclusion and the Islamic financial services industry in Muslim countries. The findings show that, despite growth in the financial sector in many Muslim countries over the past few decades, many individuals and firms are still financially excluded. An analysis of the use of and access to financial services by adults and firms also shows that most Muslim countries lag behind other emerging economies in both respects, with a rate of financial inclusion of only 27%. Cost, distance, documentation, trust, and religious requirements are among the important obstacles. In addition, not surprisingly, the extent of Islamic microfinance is very limited, small by international standards; it accounts for a small proportion of microfinance, about 0.5% of global microfinance, and lacks a cost-efficient service model. This study suggests that Islamic instruments for redistributing income such as awqaf, qard-al-hassan, sadaqa, and zakah, can play a role in bringing more than 40 million people, who are financially excluded for religious reasons, into the formal financial system. The Islamic financial services industry has a long way to go in improving financial inclusion in many Muslim countries due to the scale needed and its relatively weak infrastructure.     

金融产品监管的国际实践及启示

此次国际金融危机显示,过快的金融产品创新和国际化发展在缺乏有效监管的情况下,可能成为引发系统性风险的导火索。危机后,各国当局将金融监管的触角延伸到金融产品层面。以产品监管为核心的功能性监管的确立,是金融监管发展过程中的一个重要里程碑,它实现了金融监管活动向金融体系最微观、最基础元素的延伸。当前,各国在金融产品监管领域的实践,对于我国开展金融产品监管具有重要的启示意义。     

Harmful events and misconducts in financial organizations: Human biases and root causes

We conduct a large scope field investigation of 19 major incidents in 19 large European insurance and banking institutions, based on 116 post-event interviews with managers and top executives over a two-year period. We demonstrate the power of the Root Cause Analysis (RCA) method for detecting human biases documented by the behavioral finance, the organizational behavior and occupational psychology literatures. These biases constitute key operational risk factors these organizations. We find that organizational biases (such as a breach of psychological contract) take center stage as root causes of incidents in these organizations. We also find that banks are more exposed to emotional biases (fear and greed) and insurance companies more subjected to cognitive conservatism as root cause biases. This research has direct implications regarding how banks and insurance companies may cope with regulations that put a greater emphasis on measuring and controlling operational risk and specifically misconduct risk.     

美国金融监管改革法案与其现实的借鉴意义

2010年7月21日,美国总统奥巴马签署了《多德-弗兰克华尔街改革和消费者保护法案》,该法案正式生效。文章对该法案的内容进行了解析,详细介绍了该法案在促进金融稳定、重塑银行业监管格局、加强对大型银行的监管、强化金融消费者权益保护、完善银行业及金融市场基础设施监管等核心内容方面的立法宗旨和具体措施,并进一步阐述了该法案对完善我国金融监管的重要借鉴意义。     

CDOs and the financial crisis: Credit ratings and fair premia

We study risk and return characteristics of CDOs using the market standard models. We find that fair spreads on CDO tranches are much higher than fair spreads on similarly-rated corporate bonds. Our results imply that credit ratings are not sufficient for pricing, which is surprising given their central role in structured finance markets. This illustrates limitations of the rating methodologies that are solely based on real-world default probabilities or expected losses and do not capture risk premia. We also demonstrate that CDO tranches have large exposure to systematic risk and thus their ratings and prices are likely to decline substantially when credit conditions deteriorate.     

金融监管体系演进与发展趋势问题研究——基于金融危机视角

从金融危机的视角看,金融监管体系演进与发展和金融危机密切相关。监管当局为了维护金融体系的安全与稳定,降低金融危机的影响与危害,避免金融危机的再次发生,总是不断寻找新的监管重点、变革监管范围和手段,来保持金融监管的有效性。本文从三代金融危机导致金融体系不稳定的因素存在差异出发,阐述金融监管体系变革的过程和发展趋势,并得出了几点启示。     

Behavior in a simplified stock market: the status quo bias, the disposition effect and the ostrich effect

Previous literature suggests specific behavioral tendencies cause investors to deviate from optimal investing. We investigate three such tendencies in a simplified stock market. Subjects do trade for better stocks, but do not reach their maximum potential earnings, most commonly because they choose to ignore information and continue to hold on to a stock regardless of its performance. The results support the predictions of the status quo bias, but not the ostrich effect or the disposition effect. This research is an extension of Brown’s undergraduate honors thesis at Ohio State University. Financial support was provided by the Honor’s College and the Department of Economics at Ohio State University. Kagel’s research was partially supported by grants from the National Science Foundation. We received helpful comments from Hal Arkes, David Cooper and two anonymous referees.     

Market-specific and currency-specific risk during the global financial crisis: Evidence from the interbank markets in Tokyo and London

This paper investigates how international money markets reflected credit and liquidity risk during the global financial crisis. After matching the currency denomination, we examine how the Tokyo Interbank Offered Rate (TIBOR) was synchronized with the London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR). We find remarkably asymmetric responses in market-specific and currency-specific risk during the crisis. The regression results suggest that market-specific credit risk increased the difference across markets, whereas liquidity risk caused the difference across currency denominations. They also support the view that liquidity shortage of the US dollar occurred in international money markets during the crisis. Coordinated central bank liquidity provisions were useful in reducing the liquidity shortage of the US dollar, but their effectiveness was asymmetric across markets.     

Impact of the global financial crisis on Islamic and conventional stocks and bonds

This study explores the impact of the global financial crisis (GFC) on Islamic and conventional stock and bond indices in 11 Islamic and eight non‐Islamic countries. We find that there are benefits of Islamic stocks during the GFC, particularly during the early stage of the crisis because Islamic institutions are prohibited from holding sub‐prime mortgage securities and derivatives. The strongest benefits of Islamic stocks are in the UK and USA. We conclude that there are benefits of risk reduction and stability for Islamic stocks during a financial crisis, although not necessarily during a global recession.