We assess dealer behavior in the specials market for US Treasury securities by comparing dealer participation in the Federal Reserve's securities loan auctions with prices in the private market. Dealer behavior is generally consistent with the law of one price and apparent violations can largely be explained by institutional differences between the private market and the Fed's program. However, for auctions that are effectively noncompetitive, dealers regularly pass up true arbitrage opportunities and frequently overpay to borrow securities. Dealers apparently do not realize that certain auctions are noncompetitive, even though the information needed to discern this fact is publicly available in advance.

We analyze the risk-taking incentives of a financial conglomerate that combines a bank and a non-bank financial intermediary. The conglomerate's risk-taking incentives depend on the level of market discipline it faces, which in turn is determined by the conglomerate's liability structure. We examine optimal capital regulation for standalone institutions, for integrated conglomerates and holding company conglomerates. We show that, when capital requirements are set optimally, capital arbitrage within holding company conglomerates can raise welfare by increasing market discipline. Because they have a single balance sheet, integrated conglomerates extend the reach of the deposit insurance safety net to their non-bank divisions. We show that the extra risk-taking that this effect causes may wipe out the diversification benefits within integrated conglomerates. We discuss the policy implications of these results.