This article examines how consolidation, along with the use of credit-scoring models for lending, may be reflected in recent patterns of small business lending by banks. The authors find that the market for small business lending has been substantially influenced both by the wave of bank...

The discussion briefly reviews the events leading up to the adoption of the European Monetary System in March 1979 and the associated Exchange Rate Mechanism. It goes on to describe the Maastricht Treaty and to review the costs and benefits of a common currency. The author also considers the...

Recent experience with exchange rate management has rekindled interest in the efficacy of foreign exchange intervention. While there is broad evidence that sterilized intervention has no effect on the exchange rate through a portfolio balance channel, less evidence exists on the signalling role...

Homeownership has long been a cherished American goal, but many now find that homeownership is no longer possible. The median household income of potential first-time homebuyers is now estimated to be only three-quarters that required to afford the median-priced starter home. As a consequence,...

The wave of bank and savings and loan failures in the 1980s and early 1990s, and the resulting losses to deposit insurance funds, served to highlight the need for banks to hold sufficient capital to survive difficult times. In addition, many argued that deposit insurance reduces the market...

New England's recovery from our most recent recession has been marked by unusually slow growth in bank lending. As of the third quarter of 1994, total loans still had recovered only to 76 percent of the level attained at the peak in the third quarter of 1989. Numerous recent studies have...

To improve our understanding of the role of banks in the transmission of monetary policy, the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston convened a conference in June of 1995 to consider the question, "Is Bank Lending Important for the Transmission of Monetary Policy?" That banks are an important element in...