We analyze the transmission effects of monetary policy in a general equilibrium model of the financial sector, with bank lending and securities markets. Bank lending is constrained by capital adequacy requirements, and asymmetric information adds a cost to outside bank equity capital. In our model, monetary policy does not affect bank lending through changes in bank liquidity; rather, it operates through changes in the spread of bank loans over corporate bonds, which induce changes in the aggregate composition of financing by firms, and in banks' equity-capital base. The model produces multiple equilibria, one of which displays all the features of a "credit crunch."

Cross-country bank lending appears to be subject to market imperfections leading to persistent interest rate differentials. In a model where banks need to cope with liquidity shocks by borrowing or by liquidating assets, we study the scope for international interbank market integration with unsecured lending when cross-country information is noisy. We find that an equilibrium with integrated markets need not always exist, and that it may coexist with one characterized by segmentation. A repo market reduces interest rate spreads and improves upon the segmentation equilibrium. However, it may destroy the unsecured integrated equilibrium.

Journal Article Monopolistic Behaviour, Prices and Quantities Get access Xavier Freixas Xavier Freixas Université des Sciences Sociales, Toulouse Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The Review of Economic Studies, Volume 47, Issue 4, July 1980, Pages 747–753, https://doi.org/10.2307/2296940 Published: 01 July 1980 Article history Received: 01 September 1978 Accepted: 01 September 1979 Published: 01 July 1980

[A lesson of the recent financial crisis is that the interbank market is crucial for banks facing uncertainty regarding their liquidity needs. This article studies the efficiency of the interbank market in allocating funds. We show that the central bank should lower the interbank rate when confronted with a crisis that causes a disparity in the liquidity held among banks. This suggests that the traditional tenet prescribing the separation between prudential regulation and monetary policy should be abandoned. We also show that failure to cut interest rates during a crisis erodes financial stability by increasing the risk of bank runs.]

The increased fragility of the banking industry has generated growing concern about the risks associated with payment systems. Although in most industrial countries different interbank payment systems coexist, little is really known about their properties in terms of risk and efficiency. How should payment systems be designed? We tackle this question by comparing the two main types of payment systems, gross and net, in a framework where uncertainty arises from several sources: the time of consumption, the location of consumption, and the return on investment. Payments across locations can be made either by directly transferring liquidity or by transferring claims against the bank in the other location. The two mechanisms are interpreted as the gross and net settlement systems in interbank payments. We characterize the equilibria in the two systems and identify the trade-off in terms of safety and efficiency.Journal of Economic LiteratureClassification Numbers: G21, E51.

We provide a microfounded framework for the welfare analysis of macroprudential policy within a model of rational bubbles. For this, we posit an overlapping generation model where productivity and credit supply are subject to random shocks. We find that when real interest rates are lower than the rate of growth, credit financed bubbles may be welfare improving because of their role as a buffer in channeling excessive credit supply and inefficient investment at the firms’ level, but their sudden price decrease may cause a systemic crisis. Therefore, a well designed macroprudential policy plays a key role in improving efficiency while preserving financial stability. Our theoretical framework allows us to compare the efficiency of alternative macroprudential policies. Contrarily to conventional wisdom, we show that macroprudential policy (i) may be efficient even in the absence of systemic risk, (ii) has to be contingent on productivity shocks and (iii) must be contingent upon the level of real interest rates.

Cross-country bank lending appears to be subject to market imperfections leading to persistent interest rate differentials. In a model where banks need to cope with liquidity shocks by borrowing or by liquidating assets, we study the scope for international interbank market integration with unsecured lending when cross-country information is noisy. We find that an equilibrium with integrated markets need not always exist, and that it may coexist with one characterized by segmentation. A repo market reduces interest rate spreads and improves upon the segmentation equilibrium. However, it may destroy the unsecured integrated equilibrium.

We study how relationship lending and transaction lending vary over the business cycle. We develop a model in which relationship banks gather information on their borrowers, allowing them to provide loans to profitable firms during a crisis. Because of the services they provide, operating costs of relationship banks are higher than those of transaction banks. Relationship banks charge a higher intermediation spread in normal times, but offer continuation lending at more favourable terms than transaction banks to profitable firms in a crisis. Using credit register information for Italian banks before and after the Lehman Brothers' default, we test the theoretical predictions of the model.

For every range of admissible incomes, the authors characterize the class of Engel curves with the property that if an economy has, first, a price independent distribution of income and, second, preferences which are identical across consumers and generate Engel curves in the class, then the corresponding aggregate demand function satisfies the Weak Axiom of Revealed Preference. This class is defined by two simple conditions. The no-torsion condition says that, in the relevant range of income, the Engel curve is contained in a plane through the origin. The uniform-curvature condition says that, in addition, the Engel curve is either convex or concave to the origin. Copyright 1987 by The Econometric Society.