We assess the effects of the sovereign debt crisis on Italian banks' activity using aggregate data on funding and loan rates, lending quantities and income statements for the period 1991-2011. We augment standard reduced-form equations for the variables of interest with the spread on 10-year...

This paper analyzes firms' difficulties in accessing credit before and during the crisis, by focusing on two of their characteristics: financial fragility and growth prospects. Our econometric analysis indicates that fragile financial conditions were associated with a much higher than average...

This paper analyses the main microeconomic determinants of Italian banks' purchases of sovereign debt securities from 2007 to 2013, with special reference to their balance-sheet conditions. The analysis distinguishes two phases of the crisis – the period following the Lehman Brothers collapse...

After the crisis, from 2008 to 2010 the share of indebted households decreased both owing to a reduction in loan demand and stricter supply conditions. The reduction regarded mortgages and involved low-income households and the self-employed. Recourse to consumer credit remained stable; it...

More than three years since the outbreak of the sovereign debt crisis in the euro area the banking systems of several countries remain exposed to the vagaries of government bond markets. The paper analyzes the different channels through which sovereign risk affects banking risk (and vice versa),...