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Journal of Corporate Finance Vol. 77 2022

The asset reallocation channel of quantitative easing. The case of the UK

Simone Giansante1,2; Mahmoud Fatouh3,4; Steven Ongena5,6

1 University of Bath · 2 University of Palermo · 3 University of Essex · 4 Bank of England · 5 University of Zurich · 6 Swiss Finance Institute

open access

Abstract

We investigate the impact of the Bank of England's asset purchase program (APP) on the composition of assets of UK banks with unique data on the received reserves injections. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) didn’t expect there to be strong transmission of the APP’s impact through the bank lending channel. We find that compared to the control group, treated banks reallocated their assets towards lower risk-weighted investments, such as government securities, but did not provide more credit to the real economy. Overall, our findings suggest that when banks are not adequately capitalised, risk-based capital constraints can limit the effectiveness of expansionary unconventional monetary policies and provide incentives for carry trade activities.

DOI
10.1016/j.jcorpfin.2022.102294
Volume
77
Pages
102294
Language
en
Sources
bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref

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