The health of the U.S. economy is heavily dependent on the health of the banking system. Commercial banks support economic activity through a number of traditional services-taking deposits, making loans, and providing payment services. Many of today's large banking organizations, however, don't...

In the wake of the passage of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, the separation of banking from commercial activity is now one of the few remaining pieces of Depression-era banking law. In this article I explore the incentives that banks and commercial firms might have to affiliate. I also outline some...

This paper examines a banking regime similar to the "convoy" scheme which prevailed in Japan through most of the 1990s. Insolvent banks are merged with solvent banks rather than closed, with the acquiring banks required to accept negative value banks at zero value. I demonstrate that a convoy...

This paper conducts a case study of the impact of the May 6, 1997, announcement of enhanced independence of the Bank of England on estimates of expected future inflation and real interest rates. These are generated from observed yields on conventional and index-linked British gilts. For the...