Knowledge that Transforms

Increased awareness of the importance of non-bank financial infrastructures has brought increased concern about the potential for bailouts and the resultant moral hazard problem. This paper examines the question with regard to derivatives central counterparties. We consider the layers of protection that derivatives central clearing parties (CCPs) have established in the absence of an expectation of regulatory rescue. We then provide a model of the tension between the desire for ex post rescue of a systemically important financial infrastructure and the desire to maintain ex ante discipline on the infrastructure. The model illustrates the factors that should lead to relaxation or tightening of the financial regulator's discretion for rescue. We consider examples of failures of derivatives CCPs in order to highlight the importance of these considerations.

This paper examines the relationship between banks’ capitalization strategies and their corporate governance and executive compensation schemes for an international sample of banks over the 2003–2011 period. Shareholder-friendly corporate governance, in the form of a separation of the CEO and chairman of the board roles, intermediate board size, and an absence of anti-takeover provisions, is associated with lower bank capitalization, consistent with shareholder incentives to shift risk towards the financial safety net. Higher values of executive option and stock wealth invested in the bank are associated with higher capitalization as a potential reflection of executive risk aversion, but the risk-taking incentives embedded in executive compensation packages are associated with lower capitalization.

Do government-sponsored bank recapitalization programs spur lending and reduce risk? This paper assesses the impact of Indonesia’s bank recapitalization program on lending and bank risk following the Asian financial crisis of 1997. Using unique bank-level data, difference-in-differences estimates suggest that recapitalization increased lending (and more so for larger banks), but also boosted bank risk in the long term. Results remain robust to considerations of (1) bank-level differences in political connections, business group affiliation, ownership type, and (2) changes in macroeconomic conditions, capital requirements, accounting regulations, and public credit registry availability.

We study the effects of regulatory interventions and capital support (bailouts) on banks’ liquidity creation. We rely on instrumental variables to deal with possible endogeneity concerns. Our key findings, which are based on a unique supervisory German dataset, are that regulatory interventions robustly trigger decreases in liquidity creation, while capital support does not affect liquidity creation. Additional results include the effects of these actions on different components of liquidity creation, lending, and risk taking. Our findings provide new and important insights into the debates about the design of regulatory interventions and bailouts.

Bank managers can buy risky assets through a regulated bank and through an off-balance sheet special purpose vehicle (SPV). The choice of the preferred entity depends on whether bank managers can lower the cost of SPV funding by guaranteeing SPV returns with bank proceeds. When there are no guarantees, using the SPV is more profitable for high levels of the minimum capital requirement, in which case the SPV crowds out the bank. Contrary, when bank managers guarantee SPV returns, the bank needs to operate for the SPV to take advantage of recourse to the bank’s balance sheet also when the capital requirement is high. The bank and the SPV intermediation become complements.

Based on comprehensive regulatory data on equity mutual fund option use from the SEC's N-SAR filings, we are the first to present consistent evidence that equity funds' option use generates higher risk-adjusted performance. We further show that this is a direct effect of option use and not an indirect effect of other fund characteristics. Option use also directly results in lower systematic risk, as funds show significantly lower market betas during periods of options usage. Finally, mutual funds use options mainly for hedging as they primarily use protective puts and covered calls. These results are independent of known phenomena, such as the low beta anomaly, and robust to tests for endogeneity and a novel 5-factor model including an investable option strategy factor (IOS). Overall, our findings show that mutual fund option use is beneficial to investors and does not pose risk to the financial system as feared by the SEC. Our results are thus important for investors as well as regulators.

In September 2008, the government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs), Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, were placed into conservatorship. The GSEs' equity prices dropped considerably in response, and, as a result, many banks that held sizable amounts of the preferred stock of the two GSEs recognized substantial losses. Fifteen failures and two mergers resulted. We treat these losses as plausibly exogenous, unanticipated, supply-side shocks to bank lending, as they are likely unrelated to demand-side factors that could affect lending, and because GSE investments were considered to be safe by banks, regulators, and rating agencies. As a result, this event allows us to examine the relationship between community bank condition and lending during the global financial crisis. We find that, following the shock, loan growth at exposed banks was about 2 percentage points lower than other banks.

Financial inclusion—defined as the use of formal accounts—can bring many benefits to individuals. Yet, we know very little about the factors underpinning it. This paper explores the individual and country characteristics associated with financial inclusion and the policies that are effective among those most likely to be excluded: poor, rural, female or young individuals. Overall, we find that greater financial inclusion is associated with lower account costs, greater proximity to financial intermediaries, stronger legal rights, and more politically stable environments. However, the effectiveness of policies to promote inclusion varies depending on the characteristics of the individuals considered.

This paper offers a historical perspective on the evolution of central banks as lenders of last resort (LOLR). Countries differ in the statutory powers of the LOLR, which is the outcome of a political bargain. Collateralized LOLR lending as envisioned by Bagehot (1873) requires five key legal and institutional preconditions, all of which required political agreement. LOLR mechanisms evolved to include more than collateralized lending. LOLRs established prior to World War II, with few exceptions, followed policies that can be broadly characterized as implementing “Bagehot's Principles”: seeking to preserve systemic financial stability rather than preventing the failure of particular banks, and limiting the amount of risk absorbed by the LOLR as much as possible when providing financial assistance. After World War II, and especially after the 1970s, generous deposit insurance and ad hoc bank bailouts became the norm. The focus of bank safety net policy changed from targeting systemic stability to preventing depositor loss and the failure of banks. Statutory powers of central banks do not change much over time, or correlate with country characteristics, instead reflecting idiosyncratic political histories.