The largest national banks apparently have turned the corner on asset quality issues, but this improving trend has not yet emerging across the Eighth District.

Although bank small business loan portfolios continue to shrink, there are hints of possible stabilization. Among smaller banks, small business lending that is not backed by commercial real estate looks slightly healthier than small business lending that is secured by commercial property....

The usefulness of audit report and the effectiveness of a qualified audit opinion in communicating information about the outcome of audit engagement represent an ongoing debate in the auditing profession. Our research contributes to this important debate by providing experimental evidence...

Motivated by recent studies that show female CFOs are more risk averse than male CFOs when making various corporate decisions, we examine whether banks take into consideration the gender of CFOs when pricing bank loans. We find that in our sample, firms under the control of female CFOs on...

This paper examines what influences Russian households’ decisions to save and borrow. We use the 2008 data from the 17th round of the Russia Longitudinal Monitoring Survey (RLMS-HSE). Our results show that the determinants of saving and borrowing are not only those suggested by economic theory...

In the period prior to the financial crisis, leverage in the financial system increased substantially. This buildup was likely facilitated by, among other factors, a loosening of credit terms related to OTC derivatives and securities financing transactions. However, little or no systematic data...

The effect of bank capital on lending is a critical determinant of the linkage between financial conditions and real activity, and has received especial attention in the recent financial crisis. We use panel-regression techniques--following Bernanke and Lown (1991) and Hancock and Wilcox (1993,...

Why was the increase in the money stock so small when the increase in the monetary base was so large?

This paper examines the recent credit slowdown among Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) countries from three analytical angles. First, it finds that, similar to other regions and to its past history, a credit boom preceded the current slowdown, and that a protracted period of sluggish...

This paper reviews monetary transmission mechanisms in low-income countries (LICs) to identify aspects of the channels that may operate differently in LICs relative to advanced and emerging economies. Given the weak institutional frameworks, reduced role of securities markets, imperfect...