This book has three main objectives: (a) to discuss the main implications that consumers' inability to make rational choices can have on the functioning of second pillars, (b) to describe how jurisdictions have tried to address these problems through ad hoc policy interventions, and (c) to...

This paper aims at providing theoretical foundations to the role of customer relationship as a strategic barrier to entry on banking markets. A bank which grants a loan to a customer gains a comparative advantage in information on this customer as compared with competitors. This informational...

In this paper we investigate the history of negotiable instruments and the holder in due course rule and contrast their function and consequences in the 1700s with their function and consequences today. We explain how the holder in due course rule works and identify ways in which the rule's...

Strong lending relationships between banks and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) play a key role in the bank-based financial system of Germany. So far, they have been mainly described by the notion of a housebank and transactional features of long-term bank-customer relationships. In...

Dans le cadre du contexte francais actuel, les PME qui ne peuvent pas s'autofinancer et qui n'ont pas acces au marche financier (trop petit chiffre d'affaires) sont fortement dependantes des banques. Elles rencontrent des difficultes a se faire reconnaitre a leur juste valeur du faitd'une...

Levels of interest rates below historical norms may have enhanced financial instability in developed and developing economies during the 2000's. The risk taking channel of monetary policy transmission is a recent theory that explains the interaction between risk perceptions of the financial...

Levels of interest rates below historical norms may have enhanced financial instability in both developed and in developing economies during the 2000´s. The risk-taking channel of monetary transmission policy is a recent theory that explains theinteraction between risk perceptions of the...

The recent financial crisis has brought to the forefront the need for a better understanding of the transmission mechanisms of monetary policy. The main step forward on this issue has drawn on work aimed at stressing the role of the financial sector in this transmission. Particular emphasis has...

This paper argues that the extent of financial contagion exhibits a form of phase transition: as long as the magnitude of negative shocks affecting financial institutions are sufficiently small, a more densely connected financial network (corresponding to a more diversified pattern of interbank...

We analyse the impact of monetary policy on bank risk-taking and pricing. Bolivia provides us with an excellent experimental setting to identify this impact. Its small economy is not synchronized with the US economy but its banking system is almost fully dollarized. Consequently the US federal...