Nationally chartered banks will be allowed to branch across state lines beginning June 1, 1997. Whether they will depends on their assessment of the profitability of such a delivery system for their services and on their preferences regarding risk and return. The authors investigate the probable...

Commercial banks leverage their equity capital with demandable debt that participates in the economy's payments system. The distinctive nature of this debt generates an unusual degree of liquidity risk that can, at times, threaten the payments system. To reduce this threat, insurance protects...

The Riegle-Neal Interstate Banking and Branching Efficiency Act, passed in September 1994 and effective June 1, 1997, will allow nationally chartered banks to branch across state lines. This act will remove impediments to interstate expansion and permit the consolidation of existing interstate...

The authors argue for a shift in the focus of modeling production from the traditional assumptions of profit maximization and cost minimization to a more general assumption of managerial utility maximization that can incorporate risk incentives into the analysis of production and recover...

Bank consolidation is a global phenomenon that may enhance stakeholders’ value if managers do not sacrifice value to build empires. We find strong evidence of managerial entrenchment at U.S. bank holding companies that have higher levels of managerial ownership, better growth opportunities,...

This paper analyzes the potential competitive effects of the proposed bifurcated application of Basel II capital regulations in the United States on bank credit card lending activities. For this purpose, the authors consider the Basel II regulations as stated in the June 2004 Basel Committee...

The authors analyze the potential competitive effects of the proposed Basel II capital regulations on U.S. bank credit card lending. They find that bank issuers operating under Basel II will face higher regulatory capital minimums than Basel I banks, with differences due to the way the two...

Strategic default behavior suggests that the default process is not only a matter of inability to pay. Economic costs and benefits affect the incidence and timing of defaults. As with prior research, the authors find that people default strategically as their home value falls below the mortgage...

For nearly two decades banks in the United States have consolidated in record numbers--in terms of both frequency and the size of the merging institutions. Rhoades (1996) hypothesizes that the main motivators were increased potential for geographic expansion created by changes in state laws...

Using modern duality theory to recover technologies from data can be complicated by the risk characteristics of production. In many industries, risk influences cost and revenue and can create the potential for costly episodes of financial distress. When risk is an important consideration in...