In recent decades, there has been a clear trend towards the consolidation of banking. The first part of this paper reviews and contrasts different theoretical approaches that aim to explain that phenomenon. In the second and third sections, we present an analysis of the consolidation of banking...

The increase in the concentration of the banking industry across European Union countries during the last fifteen years can be explained in terms of: a) global factors, like the comprehensive adoption of technological innovations, the intensification of competition that has resulted from the...

The widely publicized banking takeover battle sustained by the British Barclays and a consortium led by the Royal Bank of Scotland that included the Dutch Fortis and the Spanish Santander, for the Dutch ABN AMRO, took place during six months, from March through October of 2007. The myriad legal...

Extreme volatility and high uncertainty characterized European financial markets between 2010-2012. In addition to the "financial contagion" effects of the 2007-2009 Subprime Mortgages crisis, the European financial markets' turbulence was also related to a more fundamentally economic reality:...

The unexpected Eurozone Sovereign Debt Crisis (2010–2012) aroused different attempts of interpretation among analysts and practitioners. While some attributed the crisis to a “contagion” effect of the Subprime Mortgages Financial Crisis in the United States (2007–2009), others saw in it...