Traditional concerns about concentration in product markets have centered on the social losses associated with the mispricing that occur when market power is exercised. This paper focuses on a potentially greater loss from market power -- a reduction in cost efficiency brought about by the lack...

This paper examines the efficiency and price effects of mergers by applying a frontier profit function to data on bank quot;megamergers.quot; We find that merged banks experience a statistically significant 16 percentage point average increase in profit efficiency rank relative to other large...

This paper analyzes the determinants of interest margins in the Colombian Financial System. Based on the model by Ho and Saun- ders (1981), interest margins are modelled as a function of the pure spread and bank-speci¯c institutional imperfections using quarterly data for the period...

Este trabajo examina los efectos de las fusiones en el sistema ban- cario sobre la eficiencia del sistema y los precios. Se encuentra que los bancos que han atravesado procesos de fusiones pueden experimentar mejoras en los indices de eficiencia en beneficios. Estas mejoras en eficiencia fueron...

Despite recent innovations that might have reduced banks' reliance on brick-and-mortar branches for distributing retail financial services, the number of U.S. bank branches has continued to increase steadily over time. Further, an increasing percentage of these branches are held by banks with...

Despite recent innovations that might have reduced banks' reliance on brick-and-mortar branches for distributing retail financial services, the number of U.S. bank branches has continued to increase steadily over time. Further, an increasing percentage of these branches are held by banks with...

Despite recent innovations that might have reduced banks' reliance on brick-and-mortar branches for distributing retail financial services, the number of U.S. bank branches has continued to increase steadily over time. Further, an increasing percentage of these branches are held by banks with...

This paper studies the effect of bank relationships on underwriter choice in the U.S. corporate-bond underwriting market following the 1989 commercial-bank entry. I find that bank relationships have positive and significant effects on a firm's underwriter choice, over and above their effects on...

This study measures the efficiency of the branching network of a large U.S. commercial bank over 1989-1991. We find that branches are on average about half of cost-efficient level, so that there are about twice as many branches as would minimize costs. This 'overbranching' raises operating costs...

This paper uses Data Envelopment Analysis to measure labor use efficiency of individual branches of a large public sector bank with several thousand branches across India. We find considerable variation in the average levels of efficiency across the four metropolitan regions considered in this...