Political regimes and bank interest margins

The political determinants of banks' profitability are yet to be fully explored in the political economy of finance literature. This article brings politics to the theoretical discussion and the empirical analysis of bank interest margins, arguing that differences in political regimes are crucial in accounting for variations in banking profits across countries. The paper argues that we should expect lower margins from financial intermediation in autocracies than in democracies because of an inherent credibility problem and a lack of oversight in the former. Limited by state-owned banks or regulations favoring cronies, the room for financial elites to develop independent political power to threaten the government should be lower in autocracies than in democracies. I test this hypothesis with nonparametric (matching) and parametric analyses, where the former is used to estimate the latter to lower model dependence. The results consistently show that banks' interest margins in autocracies are lower by some amount between -0.4 and -1.3. This association is also confirmed indirectly when we analyze the impact of banking competition. The existence of big banks in democracies is positively related to banks' profits from intermediation, while the opposite is true for autocracies.     

The impact of bank competition and concentration on bank risk-taking behavior and stability: Evidence from GCC countries

This paper presents a comprehensive assessment of the impact of competition on bank fragility pre and post financial crisis period in the GCC banking market as measured by bank risk-taking behavior and bank stability during the period 1998–2016. Our results indicate that a higher level of bank competition and the greater degree of concentration adds to financial fragility. The findings further shows that during the 2008 crisis, lower bank competition maintain the stability of GCC banks. We also find that lower level of competition and lower concentration in the banking market increases the risk-taking behavior of the low capitalized, low liquid and small banks which add to fragility in the banking system. Our findings suggest that countries with greater capital stringency, greater supervisory power, greater market discipline, and private monitoring, with explicit deposit insurance schemes, higher shareholder protection, and higher legal efficiency decrease banks’ risk-taking and increase their stability. We also find that greater regulatory restrictions and higher creditor protection decrease banks’ stability and increase risk in concerned countries. We find support for both competition-fragility and competition-stability hypotheses in the GCC banking market. The results also confirm that the use of a single measure of competition is insufficient to assess the role of competition in banking stability.     

Endogenous network efficiency,macroeconomy, and competition: Evidence from the Portuguese banking industry

Although performance analysis has become a vital part of the banking industry, research on the efficiency of Portuguese banking remains scarce and focused on discussing rankings to the detriment of unveiling its productive structure relative to its competition. This issue is of utmost importance considering the relevant transformations in the Portuguese economy over the last ten years. In this study, we developed a network productive structure comprising two paradigms (the production and intermediation approaches, respectively) to assess how market competition and other macro-economic variables impact bank efficiency and their feedback effects in Portugal. Unlike previous research, an integrated multi-layer perceptron (MLP)/hidden Markov model (HMM) was used for the first time to unveil endogeneity among banking competition, macro-economic variables, and the efficiency levels of the production and intermediation approaches in banking. The findings illustrate the pattern of interaction among these variables and verify that the production efficiency is the cornerstone of endogeneity in Portuguese banks. Policy makers will find the results helpful.     

Indirect Convertibility,Equity‐Based Banking and Financial Stability

Banking reform proposals put forward in the wake of the recent financial crisis maintain that equity‐based banking would be stable and would prevent bank runs. This article argues that complementing this form of banking with an indirect convertibility monetary standard and thereby dispensing with base money would enhance financial stability further. Banks would not hold a distinctive asset (base money) that would be called upon by customers at short notice, thereby removing the possibility of bank runs. No discrepancy in value between the two sides of a bank's balance sheet would arise as its assets (securitised loans) would be marked to market. Unlike other recent contributions, the intermediation model outlined here is not ‘limited purpose’ in nature as banks would not be restricted in the form of lending activity they can pursue. Common sources of banking and financial instability – liquidity risk, solvency risk, moral hazard – would be absent.     

The effect of banking market structure on the volatility of growth of manufacturing sectors in developing countries

I explore the effect of banking concentration and banking competition on the volatility of the growth of value added of manufacturing sectors in the developing countries. In this paper, I bring together two strands of literature, one that discusses the effect of financial intermediation on volatility of growth and another one that discusses the effect of banking concentration and competition on credit access. Following the industrial organization literature, I look at the effect of banking competition and banking concentration on the volatility of manufacturing sectors separately. I find that banking concentration has a dampening effect on the volatility of growth of the industries. On the other hand, I find that as banking competition increases, the volatility of the growth of industries increases, also.     

Off the radar: Factors behind the growth of shadow banking in Europe

This paper uses novel data from the European Central Bank and the Eurosystem on non-bank financial intermediation to investigate the potential factors of shadow banking growth for a panel of twenty-four countries in the European Union (EU). We find that the EU shadow banking system is highly procyclical and positively related to increasing demand by long-term institutional investors and to more stringent capital regulation. We show that individual entities in the shadow banking system can act as both complements and substitutes to traditional banking. In addition, we estimate four country-specific models using a Bayesian estimation method. We supplement the panel model estimates, which serve as a priori information, with data from a specific economy. We assert that, although some shadow banking determinants are uniform across countries, other may have heterogeneous effects across countries because of country-specific characteristics.     

金融控股模式下银行母公司开展银保业务的影响因素研究

金融控股模式下,研究银行母公司代理银行保险业务的影响因素,对于国内银行保险市场的竞争具有决定作用,并且对于未来国内金融控股集团的健康发展具有积极意义。文章研究了银行母公司开展银行保险业务的战略层因素、经济层因素、非经济层因素以及监管因素和其他利益相关者因素,有利于银行母公司、银行系保险公司和传统保险公司开展银行保险业务的行为选择。     

操作风险管理的治本之道:金融制度创新

操作风险是当前商业银行所面临的主要风险之一。但是,与市场风险和信用风险相比,商业银行对操作风险的认识和管理都处于较低水平。在不否认进行思想教育能在一定程度上减少操作风险损失事件的同时,着重强调了制度缺陷是我国银行业操作风险产生的根本原因,只有加强金融制度创新才能从根本上防范和化解操作风险。     

How important can bank lending shocks be for economic fluctuations?

We analyze the quantitative importance of bank lending shocks on real activity fluctuations in Norway and the UK, using structural VARs estimated on quarterly data from 1988 to 2010. We find that an adverse bank lending shock causes output to contract, and that such shocks can account for a substantial share of output volatility. This suggests that financial intermediation is an important source of shocks. The empirical analysis comprises the Norwegian banking crisis (1988–1992) and the recent period of banking failures in the UK. However, the results are also non-trivial when omitting periods of systemic banking distress from the sample.     

The impacts of competition and shadow banking on profitability: Evidence from the Chinese banking industry

This paper contributes to the empirical literature on banking profitability by testing the impacts of competition and shadow banking on bank profitability using a sample of 100 Chinese commercial banks over 2003–2013 with 417 and 395 observations. The current study fills the gaps in the empirical studies by examining the competition in different banking markets (i.e. deposit market, loan market and non-interest income market) in China and further evaluating their impacts on bank profitability. The findings show that the non-interest income market has a higher level of competition compared to the deposit market and loan market. It is further reported that a lower level of competition in deposit market leads to an increase in the profitability of Chinese commercial banks. Finally, the results suggest that shadow banking improves the profitability of Chinese banks.     

Determinants of bank interest margins in Russia: Does bank ownership matter?

This paper analyzes interest margin determinants in the Russian banking sector with a particular emphasis on the bank ownership structure. Using unique bank-level data covering Russia's entire banking sector for the 1999–2007 period, we find that the impact of a number of commonly used determinants such as market structure, credit risk, liquidity risk and size of operations differs across state-controlled, domestic-private and foreign-owned banks. At the same time, the influence of operational costs and risk aversion is homogeneous across ownership groups. The results overall suggest that the form of bank ownership needs to be considered when analyzing interest margin determinants.     

Financial fragility,uninsured deposits,and the cost of debt

Using annual data from 1995 to 2009, I analyze the impact of banks’ financial fragility on the costs of U.S. corporate bank loans. Diamond and Rajan (2001) hypothesize that financially fragile banks are able to raise funds at a lower cost and competition among banks result in some of these benefits being passed on to borrowers. My results provide broad support for this hypothesis, as I find that a one standard deviation increase in a bank's financial fragility lowers the cost of this bank's corporate loans by 7%. Since some types of regulation, such as deposit insurance, can decrease banks’ financial fragility, this paper also contributes to the debate on the benefits and costs of bank regulation which can be helpful for policy-making.     

What drives the banks' diversification decision? A dynamic nonlinear panel data approach

This paper empirically determines the drivers of functional diversification decision for 365 banks set in selected Middle East and North Africa (MENA) countries over 1988–2015. For this purpose, we use a dynamic nonlinear panel data model. Our findings reveal that both market share and financial intermediation stratify the diversification decision for the whole MENA sample. Splitting the sample shows that the risk‐adjusted profitability and the loan loss provision ratio exert a major influence over the diversification indicator for Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) banks, whereas the net interest margin ratio, the bank market share, and financial intermediation are the major drivers of the strategic decision for the remaining non‐GCC banks.     

Determinants of bank interest margins in Central and Eastern Europe: A comparison with the West

We investigate the determinants of bank interest margins in the Central and Eastern European countries (CEEC). We assess to what extent the relatively high bank margins in CEEC can be attributed to low efficiency or non-competitive market conditions, controlling for the macroeconomic environment and the influence of foreign and state-owned banks. We systematically compare CEEC banks with Western European banks. Our results indicate that banking in the CEEC is on a virtuous path, at least in the EU accession countries: Increased efficiency benefits customers, while capital adequacy supports systemic stability. In the non-accession countries, important policy actions are required.     

Identifying credit demand,financial intermediation,and supply of funds shocks: A structural VAR approach

In this paper, we identify three exogenous shocks to credit market: demand for credit, supply of funds into the financial system, and the willingness to lend of financial institutions (financial intermediation), and also, determine the contribution of these shocks to fluctuations in the credit market and overall economic activity. We estimate a structural vector autoregression model where the three credit shocks are identified with a set of sign restrictions motivated by a simple partial equilibrium model of financial intermediation. We find that the credit demand shock explains significantly the variations in the long-term loan rate proxied by the Moody’s Baa corporate bond yield, while the supply of funds shock contributes to most of the fluctuations in the short-term commercial paper rate. The financial intermediation shock drives most of the fluctuations in the quantity of loans as well as the spread between the Baa and commercial paper rates. Of the credit shocks, we find that the financial intermediation shock has the largest impact on real economic activity. In fact, our analysis implies that the sharp decline in output during the 2007–2009 financial crisis is largely attributable to the financial intermediation shock, along with shocks originating outside of the financial system.     

Institutional quality, governance, and financial development

Using banking sector and stock market development indicators, we examine the effect of institutional quality on financial development in developed and developing countries. Empirical results are based on dynamic system generalized method of moments estimations and demonstrate that a high-quality institutional environment is important in explaining financial development, specifically for the banking sector. However, the stock market development-institution relationship is contingent one, characterized by a non-monotonic pattern. The results are robust to two measurements of institutions and governance indicators, as well as estimation methods.     

Bank competition,financial development and macroeconomic stability: Empirical evidence from emerging economies

In this study, we investigate the potential contribution of bank competition to macroeconomic stability, and the interactive role of financial development. We classify macroeconomic stability into economic and financial stability. Economic stability is represented by the volatility of actual and unexpected output growth, whereas financial stability is assessed by the aggregate Z-score and volatility of the private credit-to-gross domestic product ratio. We employ two structural and two non-structural measures of bank competition in our analysis. Applying a two-step dynamic panel system (GMM) to macroeconomic data from 48 developing nations from 1999 to 2018, we find a bell-shaped relationship between bank competition and macroeconomic stability. The findings imply that a higher level of bank competition promotes macroeconomic stability by reducing output growth volatility, fluctuations in private credit, and the probability of bank default. There is an optimal level of bank competition beyond which it may foster economic and financial instability. Moreover, financial development enhances bank competition’s positive impact on macroeconomic stability.     

Policy Shocks, Market Intermediaries, and Corporate Strategy: The Evolution of Business Groups in Chile and India

Numerous countries have undergone rapid transitions in their economic environments. Yet, little is known about firms' responses to such transitions. We use field-collected data to study the evolution of eighteen large and diversified business groups in Chile (1987–1997) and India (1990–1997). The chosen periods correspond to significant deregulation in the primary markets in both countries. Conventional wisdom suggests that the intermediation roles played by business groups ought to decrease during these periods. However, we find an increase in group scope, an increase in the strength of the social and economic ties that bind together group firms, an increase in self-reported intermediation attempts by the groups, and some evidence that these actions are associated with improvements in accounting and stock-market performance of the group affiliates. We suggest that the slow development of market intermediaries, in a manner suggested by institutional economics, and the attendant lack of reduction in transaction costs in primary markets, can explain these findings.     

Shadow Banking,Chinese Style

Shadow banks are broadly defined as entities which conduct credit intermediation outside the formal banking system. Poorly regulated, engaging in opaque forms of intermediation, deeply interconnected with the official banking system, and operating with implicit government guarantees, they pose a major source of systemic risk. Yet shadow banks provide an important service by channeling credit to excluded investors, and can complement the formal banking sector. What explains the rapid proliferation of shadow banks in China? How large are they and what forms do they take? What types of risks do they pose to the financial system? And how best can China utilise the services of shadow banks while at the same time ensuring that they do not create systemic risks for the financial system?     

Why Do African Banks Lend So Little?

We put forward a plausible explanation of African banking sector under‐development in the form of a bad credit market equilibrium. Using an appropriately modified Industrial Organization model of banking, we show that the root of the problem could be unchecked moral hazard (strategic loan defaults) or adverse selection (a lack of good projects). Applying a dynamic panel estimator to a large sample of African banks, we show that loan defaults are a major factor inhibiting bank lending when institutional quality is low. We also find that once a threshold level of institutional quality has been reached, improvements in the default rate or institutional quality do not matter. This provides support for our theoretical predictions.