This study investigates the development of income-decreasing discretionary expenses surrounding CEO turnovers at banks. We expect incoming CEOs to take an earnings bath during the initial stage of their tenure. For a sample of German banks over the period 1993-2012, we document that (1) incoming...

We analyze the strategic interaction between undercapitalized banks and a supervisor who may intervene by preventive recapitalization. Supervisory forbearance emerges because political and fiscal costs undermine supervisors' commitment to intervene. When supervisors have lower credibility,...

Banks in bad financial shape are more likely to appoint executive directors from the outside than those in good shape. It is, however, not clear whether all of these appointments necessarily lead to the desired turnaround. We analyze the performance effects of new board members with external...

Traditional theory suggests that higher bank profitability (or franchise value) dissuades bank risk-taking. We highlight an opposite effect: higher profitability loosens bank borrowing constraints. This enables profitable banks to take risk on a larger scale, inducing risk-taking. This effect is...

We investigate the relationship between bank complexity and bank risk-taking using German banking data over the period 2005-2017. We find that more complex banking organizations tend to take on more risk, but that this complexity-risk nexus decreases over time. We study how regulatory...