MARKET POWER,BANK MEGAMERGERS,AND THE WELFARE OF BANK BORROWERS

We assess the effects on the welfare of corporate borrowers of the recent wave of bank consolidations in the United States that has produced a small number of very large banks. Our evidence from a sample of more than 3,000 commercial borrowers from banks involved in large mergers indicates that the wealth effects on these borrowers are highly negative, statistically significant, and economically important. These negative investor perceptions seem to be driven largely by the expectation of changes in banks’ market power resulting from the mergers.     

Financial crises and the asymmetric relation between returns on banks,risk factors,and other industry portfolio returns

We show that the relations between the returns on the banking industry, risk factors, and other industries often are asymmetric. Lagged banking industry returns seem to improve predictability but the positive impact of a 1‐month lag of the return on the banking portfolio is much higher in the lower part of the return distribution. However, after the Dodd‐Frank Act in 2010, the cross‐autocorrelation with banks is changed and becomes negative in the upper part of the distribution. Returns on banks also seem to lead returns on five risk factors. This relation, however, is not robust across the distribution.     

Monetary non-neutrality with anticipatory price setting and rational expectations

It is proved that the neutrality proposition for anticipated monetary policy fails, when markets do not continuously clear and prices partly adjust in accordance with rationally anticipated disequilibrium. The model exhibits non-uniqueness, but all solutions are non-neutral.     

Anticipated fiscal policy and adaptive learning

The impact of anticipated policy changes when agents form expectations using adaptive learning rather than rational expectations is considered. Agents are assumed to combine limited structural knowledge with a standard adaptive learning rule. These issues are analyzed using two well-known set-ups, an endowment economy and the Ramsey model. In our scenario there are important deviations from both rational expectations and purely adaptive learning. The approach could be applied to other frameworks.     

Tax treatment of dividends and capital gains and the dividend decision under dual income tax

The paper analyses efficiency aspects of a dual income tax system with a higher tax on capital gains than dividends. It argues that apart from the distortions to investments claimed in earlier literature, the system puts even more emphasis in creating incentives for entrepreneurs to participate in tax planning. The paper suggests that the owner of a closely held company can avoid all personal taxes on entrepreneurial income by two tax-planning strategies. The first is the avoidance of distributions, which would be taxed at the tax rate on labour income. These funds would instead be invested in the financial markets. The second strategy is a distribute and call-back policy, converting retained profits into new equity capital. Interestingly, the outcome is that investment in real capital is not distorted in the long-run equilibrium. Empirical evidence using microdata is also provided.      

Variance-minimizing monetary policies with lagged price adjustment and rational expectations

This paper considers a macroeconomic model with rational expectations in which prices are incompletely flexible. Markets therefore fall to clear. In such a model monetary policy is not neutral. The variance of real and nominal quantities and interest rates is sensitive to the parameters of the feedback rule that determines the money supply. The monetary policy that achieves the goal of minimizing the steady-state variance of real output is characterized. We also examine monetary policies that are restricted in their generality and derive ‘second-best’ variance-minimizing feedback rules.