This paper models an economy in which risk-averse savers and risk-neutral entrepreneurs make investment decisions. Aggregate investment in high-yielding risky projects is maximized when risk-neutral agents bear all nondiversifiable risks. A role of banks is to assume nondiversifiable risks by...

[Deposit insurance involves catastrophe risk because bank failures spike during a banking crisis. Although mutual insurance is ill-suited for catastrophe risk, the U.S. government structures deposit insurance like a mutual company owned by policyholders. The mutual structure produces several...

Deposit insurance systems are designed to balance the benefits of preventing bank runs and protecting ordinary savers against the costs of reduced market discipline and potential burdens on taxpayers. Design flaws of deposit insurance make the benefits too low and the costs too high. This paper...

This paper examines the effects of the estimated probability of bank failure on the growth rates of large time deposits and interest rates on those deposits. While riskier banks paid higher interest rates, they attracted less large time deposits in the second half of the 1980s. These results...