The UK is commonly viewed as having a ‘market oriented’ financial system, in contrast to other European countries which are seen as ‘bank dominated’. In the light of this supposition, we investigate sectoral balance sheet data for evidence of differences in financial...

As background for this special issue of the Review, this article provides an overview of recent developments in financial structure in the major industrial countries using national flow of funds balance sheet data. We focus in particular on changes in the size and composition of the balance...

The availability of bank finance to small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) is important to allow SMEs to start up and finance investment for growth. To assess changes in such availability over 2001–12, we used data from a series of surveys that provide detailed information on the...

[eng] The European pension management industry . This paper seeks to assess the current status and future prospects for private pension management in Continental Europe, with a particular focus on the nature of competition among managers of pension assets. It is shown that the pension fund...

[eng] Regulation of private pensions : a case study of the UK . There are three economic justifications to the regulation of pension funds : information assymetries, a too important market power, and externalities (due to systemic risk). In this article, the author thinks that the English...

This volume is part of a series of monographs on private pensions in OECD countries. Previous titles have considered the situation in Canada, Ireland, New Zealand and the United States. The United Kingdom pension system has some distinctive characteristics. Publicly-provided pensions have become...