We measure the consequences of asymmetric information and imperfect competition in the Italian lending market. We show that banks' optimal price response to an increase in adverse selection varies with competition. Exploiting matched data on loans and defaults, we estimate models of demand for...

We analyze the optimal regulation of a MFI that has private information on the intrinsic quality of its loan portfolio (adverse selection) and where the MFI’s choice of effort to improve this quality cannot be observed by the regulator (moral hazard). In designing optimal contracts the...

The work discusses a basic proposition in the theory of competition in markets with adverse selection (Bester, 1985). By working out the sequence of market transactions, we show that the effectiveness of collateral in avoiding equilibrium rationing depends on an assumption of uncontestability of...

In the crisis that started in 2007, banks’ off-balance sheet activity has been blamed for flooding the market with low-quality assets and contributing to spreading risk throughout the economic system. Nevertheless, this view is hardly sustainable within the context of sophisticated markets....

We propose a parsimonious model with adverse selection where delinquency, renegotiation, and bankruptcy all occur in equilibrium as a result of a simple screening mechanism. A borrower has private information about her cost of bankruptcy, and a lender may use random contracts to screen different...

We analyze a market for microfinance in a region of a developing nation in which all projects are either of high or low quality. There is adverse selection because only borrowers know whether their project is of high or low quality but the microfinance institutions (MFIs) do not. The MFIs are...

Prompted by the recent US experience, in this chapter, we study the interaction between cycles in credit markets and cycles in housing markets. There is a large growing literature exploring two different approaches: on the one hand, a boom–bust in house prices can generate a boom–bust in...

This paper studies how information frictions in the securitization market amplify the response of mortgage credit supply to house price shocks. We model securitization as an optimal contracting problem between investors and banks. Banks are better informed than investors about the quality of the...

The increasing availability of data in credit markets may appear to make adverse selection concerns less relevant. However, when there is adverse selection, more information does not necessarily increase welfare. We provide tools for making better use of the data that is collected from potential...

This paper provides a critical survey of some recent developments in the principal-agent approach to the relationship between lenders and borrowers. The costly state verification model of optimal debt contract is introduced and new results with respect to optimality of standard debt contracts in...