This paper explores the impact dividend taxes exert on the dividends repatriated from foreign affiliates to their German parent company. Based on an augmented Lintner model of firms' dividend payout decisions, the paper focusses on cross-border intra-firm dividend payments of wholly-owned...

The globalization of banking in the United States is influencing the monetary transmission mechanism both domestically and in foreign markets. Using quarterly information from all U.S. banks filing call reports between 1980 and 2005, we find evidence for the lending channel for monetary policy...

This paper investigates how multinational firms choose the capital structure of their foreign affiliates in response to political risk. We focus on two choice variables, the leverage and the ownership structure of the foreign affiliate, and we distinguish different types of political risk, such...

The German Commercial Code ("HGB") allows banks to build visible reserves for general banking risks according to section 340g HGB. These "GBR reserves" may, in addition to their risk provisioning function, be used to enhance capital endowment, for internal financing, signaling or earnings...

Developments in risk-transfer instruments and risk management techniques in the last two decades have fundamentally changed how banks manage their assets and liabilities. In this document we show that, for all three sectors of German universal banks (private commercial banks, savings banks, and...

In the last few years it has been possible to observe decreasing interest margins for German universal banks. At the same time, institutions increasingly moved part of their business from interest to fee-earning activities. This study analyzes the determinants of non-interest income and its...

This study analyzes the impact of bank relationships on a firm’s cost of debt. We focus on relationships with the main bank. We find that a firm’s cost of debt decreases with relationship strength, proxied by the share of bank debt provided by the main lender, but rises with relationship...

This paper aims to shed light on some of the major allocative consequences of financial market bubbles. In March 1997, the Neuer Markt in Germany opened. Six years later, in June 2003, it closed forever. In the interim period lay the spectacular rise and fall of the first and most important...

We use a compound option-based structural credit risk model to infer a term structure of banking crisis risk from market data on bank stocks in daily frequency. Considering debt service payments with different maturities this term structure assigns a separate estimator for short- and long-term...

Banking supervision requires regular inspection and assessment of financial institutions. In Germany this task is carried out by the central bank (“Deutsche Bundesbank, BBK”) in cooperation with the Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (“Bundesanstalt für Finanzdienstleistungsaufsicht,...