This paper examines bank fund reallocation and regional economic growth based on 1991–2005 provincial-level data of four state-owned commercial banks of China that practice fund reallocation nation-wide. We find no correlation between bank fund reallocation and regional economic growth or between bank loans and regional economic growth. We find, however, a positive association between bank deposits and growth. It appears economic growth leads financial development in China, not the other way around. Furthermore, as China’s market-oriented reforms deepen, fund reallocation and loans start to manifest positive effects on growth even though the banks are government owned.

A number of studies have investigated the causes and effects of stock market crashes. These studies mainly focus on the factors leading to a crash and on the volatility and co-movements of stock market indexes during and after the crash. However, how a stock market crash affects individual stocks and if stocks with different financial characteristics are affected differently in a stock market crash is an issue that has not received sufficient attention. In this paper, we study this issue by using data for eight major stock market crashes that have taken place during the December 31, 1962–December 31, 2007 period with a large sample of US firms. We use the event-study methodology and multivariate regression analysis to study the determinants of stock returns in stock market crashes.