We empirically investigate whether and how the ex-ante M&A activity of banks relate to their much debated bailouts and credit ratings during the 2008 financial crisis. Our M&A sample comprises of 1603 transactions performed by 41 large sized European banks over the period 1990-2006. We find that...

This paper is one of the first to investigate the determinants of bond issuance by European banks. We use a unique database of around 50,000 bonds issued by 63 banks from 14 European countries, allowing us to differentiate between different types of long-term debt securities. By investigating at...