Financial structure and income inequality
This paper empirically investigates the link between financial structure and income inequality. Using data for a panel of 97 economies over the period 1989-2012, we find that the relationship is [...]
Evaluation of the Effects of Financial Regulatory Reforms on Small and Medium-Sized Enterprise (SME) Financing
With the main elements of the G20 reforms agreed and implementation underway, an analysis of the effects of these reforms is becoming possible. To that end, the FSB developed a [...]
Central Banking for All: A Public Option for Bank Accounts
Among the perks of being a bank is the privilege of holding an account with the central bank. Unavailable to individuals and nonbank businesses, central bank accounts pay higher interest [...]
Bank Capitalization and Loan Growth
A few academic papers have recently indicated that banks with a greater amount of capital tend to lend more as a result of lower funding costs. This evidence has been [...]
Lobbying on Regulatory Enforcement Actions: Evidence from U.S. Commercial and Savings Banks
This paper analyzes the relationship between bank lobbying and supervisory decisions of regulators and documents its moral hazard implications. Exploiting bank-level information on the universe of commercial and savings banks [...]
Bailouts, Capital, or CoCos: Can Contingent Convertible Bonds Help Banks Cope with Financial Stress?
Since the 2008 financial crisis, banking regulators’ capital enhancement efforts have focused on permitting systemically important financial institutions to issue alternative forms of debt and quasi-debt instruments as a means [...]
Estimating How Basel III Liquidity Requirements Should Affect a GSIB Surcharge
This note proposes a recalibration of the global systemically important bank holding company (GSIB) capital surcharge that takes into account the impact of the liquidity coverage ratio (LCR) – one [...]
Government Guarantees and the Valuation of American Banks
Banks' ratio of the market value to book value of their equity was close to 1 until the 1990s, then more than doubled during the 1996-2007 period, and fell again [...]
Strengthening the Regulation and Oversight of Shadow Banks
This report starts by outlining the lax oversight of nonbank financial companies and the systemic-risk regulatory gaps that existed before the 2007–2008 financial crisis. Next, the report charts the development [...]
Federal Reserve Structure, Economic ideas, and Monetary and Financial Policy
The decentralized structure of the Federal Reserve System is evaluated as a mechanism for generating and processing new ideas on monetary and financial policy. The role of the Reserve Banks [...]