Manipulation of hard information has been at the center of a wave of investigations into fraudulent bank behavior, such as mis-selling of mortgages and rigging of LIBOR and FX rates. Despite these prominent cases, little is known as to why employees manipulate hard information. Using almost a...

How do changes in banking regulation affect the syndicated loan market? Because branch networks and loan syndication both facilitate banks' ability to diversify geographical credit risk, we focus on the Riegle-Neal Interstate Branching and Banking Efficiency Act of 1994. We investigate its...

Exploiting geographic variation in the exposure of U.S. banks to COVID-19 and lockdown policies we find that banks more exposed to pandemic and lockdown policies show an increase in loss provisions and non-performing loans. While we observe an increase in corporate, especially small business,...