This paper presents an exploratory agent-based model of a real time gross settlement (RTGS) payment system. Banks are represented as agents who exchange payment requests, which are settled according to a set of simple rules. The model features the main elements of a real-life system, including a...

This paper investigates how bank profitability is affected by corporate income tax (CIT) using aggregate data on the banking sector of the main industrialized countries for the period 1981-2003. Two main novelties emerge with respect to the existing literature. First, the paper explicitly...

The paper assesses whether the monthly returns of the listed shares of Italian banks are predicted by changes in balance-sheet indicators. The sample covers the period from January 1997 to June 2003. Estimates use both unadjusted and risk-adjusted returns. Results show that the stock returns of...

The paper investigates the relationship between the underground economy and financial deepening. Entrepreneurs can only access external finance by disclosing credible information in formal documentation. This may be impossible for many informal producers, who lack proper accounting records....

High concentration of creditors can have two beneficial effects on borrowers: by enhancing lenders' ability to monitor, it can reduce the likelihood of financial distress; by reducing coordination failure among creditors, it can help a distressed firm to avoid bankruptcy. However, a strong...

Using Bank of Italy data on Italian banks in the period 1990-2004, the paper analyses the short and long-run effects of the concentration of the banking industry on the availability of credit to small and medium-sized firms. Our study employs a bank-based approach and investigates the...

The availability of new harmonized data on bank interest rates allows a rigorous assessment to be made of cross-country price homogeneity/heterogeneity in euro area retail credit markets. Econometric analysis shows that the banking market is still highly segmented and that the degree of...

Bank takeovers result on average in little improvements in performance. This may be due to conflicting driving forces behind them; however these have seldom been studied. We study directly the motivations for bank acquisitions by analyzing the prices paid for them, under the assumption that...

Linguistic and cultural differences, different legal and supervisory frameworks, and relationship lending have been repeatedly mentioned as barriers to European retail banking integration. We investigate whether these barriers have affected integration within national boundaries, using an index...