How much capital and liquidity does a bank need – to support its risk taking activities? During the recent (and still ongoing) financial crisis, answers to this question using standard approaches, e.g. regulatory capital ratios, were no longer credible, and thus broad-based supervisory stress...

Financial reform must not ignore the interests of small stakeholders – who must be regarded as too small to be counted. Making equity an explicit objective is delicate: it needs to be calibrated such that the vulnerable are not exposed to further risks. Policies outside the realm of financial...

We examine the political dynamics which led to the codification of the Principles and Standards for sound compensation practices at financial institutions at international (G 20) level and to their subsequent implementation on both sides of the Atlantic. We show that the regulation of bankers'...

Credit derivatives played an important role in the Credit Crisis of 2008-09. The US Congress enacted the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act in 2010 as a comprehensive response to the Credit Crisis. Collateralized Debt Obligations (CDO) and Credit Default Swaps (CDS), which...

This study examines whether bank shareholders bear the burden of required reserves tax by analyzing the reaction of banks' stock returns to the changes in the required reserve ratio. Results show that increases in reserve requirements significantly lower bank returns implying that shareholders...

Using supervisory data for US banks, we evaluate the alignment of Basel II/III AIRB (Advanced Internal Ratings Based) risk estimates with portfolio risk. We use loan performance as a direct measure of portfolio risk as well as less direct market-based measures. Our results document that loan...

This article examines the impact of financial derivatives on systematic risk of publicly listed U.S. bank holding companies (BHCs) from 1997 to 2012. We find that the use of financial derivatives is positively and significantly related to BHCs' systematic risk exposures. Higher use of interest...

Using a worldwide bank sample from 2000 to 2010, this article analyzes the determinants of bank lending behavior during the global financial crisis highlighting the role of bank capital. It reveals that the high quality of the bank funding strategy (tier 1 bank capital and retail deposits) and...