We present a model of bank passivity and regulatory failure. Banks with low equity positions have more incentives to be passive in liquidating bad loans. We show that they tend to hide distress from regulatory authorities and are ready to offer a higher rate of interest in order to attract...

This paper investigates the possibility that newly emerging equity markets in Central Europe exhibit semi-strong form efficiency such that no relationship exists between lagged values of changes in economic variables and changes in equity prices. We find that such efficiency is characteristic of...