ver the past two decades, there has been a transformation in the U.S. financial sector. Alongside the deregulation of this industry, financial intermediation has shifted from a bankcentered process to one where nonbanks play an increasing role. Given these changes, questions arise about how banks have adapted and to what degree their traditional roles in financial intermediation have changed (s...

For much of the last decade, Japan’s banking crisis has been at the center of attention in the ongoing discussion of that country’s broader economic difficulties and of what public policy actions could alleviate them. The enormous loan losses and balance sheet erosion that nearly all Japanese banks have sustained during this period, and the resulting impairment of their ability to carry out ord...

This paper draws on network theory to investigate European banks’ sovereign debt exposures. Banks’ holdings of sovereign debt build a network of financial linkages with European countries that exhibits a long-tail distribution of node degrees. A highly connected network core of 15 banks is identified. These banks accounted for the majority of sovereign debt investments between December 2010 and...

For several years, the financial services industry has discovered the opportunities of different channels like the Internet, call-centers, WAP etc. Many banks built up separate direct banks focusing exclusively on the Internet and/or call-centers. Only recently, some banks started to reintegrate the direct banks with their traditional brickand-mortar banks in order to offer services over severa...

The payment functions of central banks vary among nations. Some central banks provide only limited payment services, such as issuing and redeeming currency and facilitating settlement among members of payments systems by transferring reserve balances.1 In the United States, the Federal Reserve has been a provider of payment services since the early 1900s. By 1918, the Fed had acquired a large s...

for banks and financial institutions, credit risk had been an essential factor that needed to be managed well. credit risk was the possibility that a borrower of counter party would fail to meet its obligations in accordance with agreed terms. credit risk; therefore arise from the bank’s dealings with or lending to corporate, individuals, and other banks or financial institutions.  credit risk...

The paper shows how excessive reporting, called “crying wolf”, can dilute the information value of reports. Excessive reporting is investigated by undertaking the first formal analysis of money laundering enforcement. Banks monitor transactions and report suspicious activity to government agencies, which use these reports to identify investigation targets. Banks face fines should they fail to r...

The banking industry is under pressure. In order to compete, banks should adapt to concentrating on the specific customer needs, following an outside-in perspective. This paper presents the design of a business model for banks that considers this development by providing flexible and comprehensive support for retail banking clients. It is demonstrated that the identification of customer process...

This paper uses variation in policies and institutional characteristics to evaluate the impacts of village-level microfinance institutions in rural Thailand. To identify impacts, we use policies related to the successful/unsuccessful provision of services as exogenous variation in effective financial intermediation. We find that institutions, particularly those with good policies, can promote a...

In the aftermath of the global financial crisis in 2008, central banks across the globe reduced their policy rates by unprecedented margins. At the same time, commercial banks were increasing their lending rates in order to protect their crisis-induced fragile balance sheets. To a large extent, these opposing reactions reduced the efficacy of monetary policy in accommodating the substantial dec...