This paper reviews academic studies of bank capital regulation in an effort to evaluate the intellectual foundation for the imposition of the Basel I and Basel II systems of risk-based capital requirements. The theoretical literature yields general agreement about the immediate effects of...

This paper examines the market-discipline and supervisory-process "pillars" of the Basel II framework. It reviews the key features of these Basel II pillars and discusses and evaluates associated conceptual issues in relation to theoretical predictions and empirical findings in the academic...

This paper evaluates the effects of binding regulatory restraints on the rate of performance-based management compensation within a banking framework in which the primary function of bank management teams is to monitor loans in order to eliminate deadweight default losses. Available management...

This study uses data from the 2002 and 2004 Health and Retirement Study to investigate the impact that health problems have on the financial strain of older Americans. Two-stage probit models are estimated for a series of financial ratio guidelines that take into account household solvency,...

This paper reexamines the determinants of credit default swaps (CDS) spreads in the U.S., Europe, and Asia-Pacific markets with a new data set using linear regressions. These determinants are categorized into two groups: firm level and macroeconomic variables. We also include two non-traditional...

The empirical literature identifying gains from financial innovation to financial institution stockholders is sparse. The literature identifying financial firms’ contributions to stockholder value resulting from long term commitment to innovation is, to our knowledge, nonexistent. Several...

Because of the dynamic inconsistency problem in optimal policies of pay-as-you-go (PAYG) systems, parametric reforms tend to be unfair in terms of generational justice and could be inefficient in terms of optimal level of consumption. As long as there are adverse shocks, the planner has to...

This paper surveys the theoretical and empirical literature on group lending programs in developing countries, with a focus on the determinants of repayment performance.

This paper revisits the conventional wisdom on the determinants of the success of microcredit programs. The paper first develops a simple moral hazard model of borrowing in a group lending context, and then tests this model using data from a survey conducted in Bangladesh in 1991-92. One of the...

Existing literature has focused attention on the impact of Basel I and similar capital requirement regulations on developed countries where such regulations were found to be effective in increasing capital ratios and reducing portfolio credit risk of commercial banks. In the present study, we...