In the aftermath of the financial crisis, the question of how to handle a big bank’s collapse has arisen. Large banks perform functions that if disrupted could seriously damage the financial sector and the real economy. The European Union’s new resolution regime introduced by the Bank...

The state-led resolution of the 2007-2009 financial crisis has proven to be costly. Calls are being heard in Belgium, the Netherlands and Switzerland to cap the size of domestic banks. Is small beautiful? In this policy paper, we first match bailing out cost data to the relative size of banks...

This paper reviews the state of the banking sector in Europe. At the aggregate level, the empirical data suggest that the Baltics, Cyprus, Greece and Ireland, in particular, are hit by a strong decline in lending in the wake of the financial crisis. This deleveraging is mainly caused by a...

The financial crisis had a major impact on the banking landscape. As troubled banks were rescued by their home country, the question arises what happened to cross-border banking. Our findings indicate that cross-border banking remains strong within Europe; the Single Market in Banking is still in...

This paper reviews the state of the banking sector in Europe. At the aggregate level, the empirical data suggest that the Baltics, Cyprus, Greece and Ireland, in particular, are hit by a strong decline in lending in the wake of the financial crisis. This deleveraging is mainly caused by a...