We review the banking literature with the view of identifying systemic externalities arising from bank failures. We are particularly interested in how such externalities may depend on the characteristics of the financial system at the time of failure, and on the characteristics of the failing...

Ongoing financial innovation and greater information availability increase the tradability of bank assets and reduce banks' dependence on individual bank managers as private information in the lending process declines. In this paper we argue that this has two effects on banks, with opposing...

We review the banking literature with the view of identifying systemic externalities arising from bank failures. We are particularly interested in how such externalities may depend on the characteristics of the financial system at the time of failure, and on the characteristics of the failing...

We present a model in which flat (cycle-independent) capital requirements are undesirable because of shocks to bank capital. There is a rationale for countercyclical capital requirements that impose lower capital demands when aggregate bank capital is low. However, such capital requirements also...

We analyze the design of bailout regimes when investment is distorted by a toomany-to-fail problem. The first-best allocation equalizes benefits from more banks investing in high-return projects with endogenously higher systemic risk due to more banks failing simultaneously. A standard bailout...

We analyze the design of bailout regimes when investment is distorted by a too-many-to-fail problem. The first-best allocation equalizes benefits from more banks investing in high-return projects with endogenously higher systemic risk due to more banks failing simultaneously. A standard bailout...