Market size structure refers to the distribution of shares of different size classes of local market participants, where the sizes are inclusive of assets both within and outside the local market. We apply this new measure of market structure in two empirical analyses of the U.S. banking...

Conventional wisdom holds that small banks have comparative advantages vis-à-vis large banks in serving small firms, while recent literature suggests this may not be the case. Using a panel of recent US start-ups, we investigate how small bank presence affects these firms in normal times...

The authors propose a more complete conceptual framework for analysis of credit availability for small and medium enterprises (SMEs). In this framework, lending technologies are the key conduit through which government policies and national financial structures affect credit availability. They...

We offer and test two competing hypotheses for the consolidation trend in banking using U.S. banking industry data over the period 1982-2000. Under the efficiency hypothesis, technological progress improved the performance of large, multimarket firms relative to small, single-market firms,...

This paper examines the efficiency and price effects of mergers by applying a frontier profit function to data on bank `megamergers'. We find that merged banks experience a statistically significant 16 percentage point average increase in profit efficiency rank relative to other large banks....

We try to identify which small businesses are most quot;debt sensitive,quot; or most likely to be affected by banking market conditions. For our primary debt sensitivity categories, we hypothesize that bank conditions are most likely to have significant effects on firms in size classes and...

We test some predictions about the effects of technological progress on geographic expansion using data on banks in U.S. multibank holding companies over 1985-1998. Specifically, we test whether over time (a) parental control over affiliate banks has increased, and (b) the agency costs...

This paper examines the efficiency and price effects of mergers by applying a frontier profit function to data on bank quot;megamergers.quot; We find that merged banks experience a statistically significant 16 percentage point average increase in profit efficiency rank relative to other large...

Traditional concerns about concentration in product markets have centered on the social losses associated with the mispricing that occur when market power is exercised. This paper focuses on a potentially greater loss from market power -- a reduction in cost efficiency brought about by the lack...

This study measures the efficiency of the branching network of a large U.S. commercial bank over 1989-1991. We find that branches are on average about half of cost-efficient level, so that there are about twice as many branches as would minimize costs. This 'overbranching' raises operating costs...