This paper studies the implications of cross-border financial integration for financial stability when banks' loan portfolios adjust endogenously. Banks can be subject to sectoral and aggregate domestic shocks. After integration they can share these risks in a complete interbank market. When...

In this paper we investigate the interaction between a credit portfolio and another risktype, which can be thought of as market risk. Combining Merton-like factor models forcredit risk with linear factor models for market risk, we analytically calculate their interriskcorrelation and show how...

This paper presents an in-depth analysis of developments in the microfinance sector beforeand after the Lehman Brothers collapse in 2008 by comparing them with developments intraditional banking sectors of emerging market economies and developing countries. Thefindings indicate that microfinance...

We use portfolio theory to quantify the efficiency of state-level sectoral patterns of production in the United States. On the basis of observed growth in sectoral value-added output, we calculate for each state the efficient frontier for investments in the real economy. We study how rapidly...

During the past two years, private equity funds have acquired substantial portfolios of nonperformingloans from banks in Germany. Typically a private equity investor does notcommit funds unless exit strategies are clearly defined. The usual exit strategies for distresseddebt investors are “fix...

We develop models for portfolio diversification in the sovereign credit default swap (CDS) markets and show that, despite literature findings that sovereign CDS spreads are affected by global factors, there is sufficient idiosyncratic risk to be diversified away. However, we identify regime...

Recent empirical studies criticize the sluggish financial integration in the euro area and find that only interbank money markets are fully integrated so far. This paper studies the optimal regional and/or sectoral integration of financial systems given that integration is restricted to the...

Heterogenous banking supervision and regulation is often considered as the most important impediment for Pan-European Bank mergers. In this paper we identify other more fundamental reasons for a limited degree of cross-country integration in retail banking. We argue that the distribution of...

This paper compares four forms of inter-regional financial risk sharing: (i) segmentation, (ii) integration trough the secured interbank market, (iii) integration trough the unsecured interbank market, (iv) integration of retail markets. The secured interbank market is an optimal risk-sharing...