We examine the impact on a firm when it is exogenously forced to switch its bank relationship from one branch to another branch of the same bank. We show the effect depends directly on the relative balance between the hard accounting information provided to the bank by the firm, as part of the...

Manipulation of hard information has been at the center of a wave of investigations into fraudulent bank behavior, such as mis-selling of mortgages and rigging of LIBOR and FX rates. Despite these prominent cases, little is known as to why employees manipulate hard information. Using almost a...