Post-IPO banks are far more likely to initiate dividends than nonfinancial firms. Moreover, dividend initiation has a major impact on the ultimate disposition of a newly public bank, increasing its likelihood of subsequent acquisition by around 40 percent and reducing the expected time until...

This paper examines how government ownership and government involvement in a country's banking system affect bank performance from 1989 through 2004. Our study uncovers an interesting pattern of changing performance differences between state-owned and privately-owned banks around the Asian...