Bank capital is an important determinant of secondary market liquidity of loans that a bank originates and syndicates. Higher bank capital is associated with significantly narrower loan bid-ask spreads. This effect is stronger when banks are subject to more external financing frictions and...

We test three hypotheses regarding changes in supervisory toughness' and their effects on bank lending. The data provide modest support for all three hypotheses that there was an increase in toughness during the credit crunch period (1989-1992), that there was a decline in toughness during the...

Over the past several years, substantial research effort has gone into measuring the efficiency of financial institutions. Many studies have found that inefficiencies are quite large, on the order of 20% or more of total banking industry costs and about half of the industry's potential profits....