Minimum capital requirement regulation forces banks to refund a substantial amount of their investments with equity. This creates a buffer against losses, but also in- creases the cost of funding. If higher refunding costs translate into higher loan interest rates, then borrowers are likely to...

Judging by only economic incentives, Malaysian financial institutions (particularly banks) should completely ignore the Competition Act. The data show that Malaysian banks probably benefit from anticompetitive behaviour. Political and family connections likely facilitate such behaviour. Given...

For emerging market regulators, shadow banking represents an activity which they must control. For businessmen in economies like Russia, Argentina, Saudi Arabia and Mexico, shadow banking represents an important business opportunity. By extending credit to risky (but promising) activities...

How should wealth managers and private bankers find and serve the wealthy - particularly in developing countries? Several banks and consulting firms provide market sizing estimates for the number of high net worth and ultra-high net worth individuals. However, it is still an open question...

In this work, we evaluate the competition in the Romanian banking system as regards the distortions in terms of market shares and the origin of capital, for the period 2000-2010, using the methodology of the structural analysis of the markets promoted by Mereuta (2012). Thus, we firstly check...

Developments in information technology are fundamentally changing many traditional business models. Progress in the IT area is bringing about one change in particular: it is reducing search costs and allowing buyers and sellers of products and services to find each other directly on web-based...

Several countries have recently introduced national capital standards exceeding the internationally coordinated Basel III rules, thus suggesting a "race to the top" in capital standards. We study regulatory competition when banks are heterogeneous and give loans to firms that produce output in...

The aim of the paper is to analyze the development of the Estonian credit and saving market, especially considering the sector of households and non-financial corporations, in order to reveal the potential of saving and loan association (SLA) to enhance the economic and social development...

Our analysis finds that despite the growing number, the majority of savings banks currently do not make any payouts. Furthermore, savings banks distribute only a small part of their net profit to the shareholders. This means that they can still build up capital even if they make payouts. Savings...

The OECD Competition Committee debated mergers in financial services in June 2000. This document includes an executive summary of that debate and the documents from the meeting: an analytical note by the OECD, written submissions from Australia, Canada, the European Commission, Finland, Germany,...