Valuable bank charters have been hypothesized to provide bank managers self-regulatory incentives to constrain their risk taking. However, this paper presents evidence that charter value itself may derive from high-risk activities, indicating that minimizing risk taking also would limit the...

The issue of bank dividend regulation has become highly controversial as the stress induced on bank capital during the 2008 financial crisis and the covid pandemic created a demand for enhanced regulation and restrictions on bank dividend payments. This paper examines this issue from a...

Recent profitability and recapitalization trends in the banking industry appear to be consistent with a hypothesis advanced by Keeley (1990) termed the quot;charter valuequot; hypothesis. Under this hypothesis banks with greater charter value voluntarily hold higher capital ratios to self-insure...