We assess the long-term economic impact of the new regulatory standards (the Basel III reform), answering the following questions. (1) What is the impact of the reform on long-term economic performance? (2) What is the impact of the reform on economic fluctuations? (3) What is the impact of the...

A growing number of studies on the US subprime market indicate that, due to asymmetric information, credit risk transfer activities have perverse effects on banks� lending standards. We investigate a large part of the market for securitized assets (�prime mortgages�) in Italy, a...

This paper provides an assessment of the costs of complying with Basel III for the Italian economy. The main findings are the following. For each percentage point increase in the capital ratio implemented over an eight-year horizon, the level of GDP would decline by 0.00-0.33% (0.03-0.39% if...

We simulate the macroeconomic and welfare implications of different fiscal consolidation scenarios in Italy using a medium scale two-areas dynamic general equilibrium currency-union model. Differently from similar models, ours is rich in the terms of fiscal features. We assume distortionary...

This paper investigates the relationship between native internal mobility and immigration in Italy, in order to gain a better understanding of the impact of immigration on local labour markets and to gauge the consequences for the socio-demographic composition of the local population. Native...

We investigate the impact of information and communication technologies (ICT) on local loan officers� autonomy in small business lending. We derive a simple agency model of the interaction between a local branch manager and the headquarters, which yields an estimable equation for the...

This paper analyzes the determinants of credit default swap spread changes for a large sample of US non-financial companies over the period between January 2002 and March 2009. In our analysis we use variables that the literature has found have an impact on CDS spreads and, in order to account...

We examine the effects of the government guarantee schemes for bank bonds adopted in the aftermath of the Lehman Brothers demise to help banks retain access to wholesale funding. We describe the evolution and the pattern of bond issuance across countries to assess the effect of the schemes. Then...

Recent empirical literature shows that key macro variables such as GDP and productivity display long memory dynamics. For DSGE models, we propose a �Generalized� Kalman Filter to deal effectively with this problem: our method connects to and innovates upon data-filtering techniques...

In the past decade changes in oil prices have played a significant role in shaping inflation dynamics in the US and in the euro area, largely through their direct effect on fuels prices, reviving the controversy over whether the prices of petroleum products respond more promptly to positive than...