The notion that some banks are “too big to fail” builds on the premise that governments will offer support to avoid the adverse consequences of their disorderly failures. However, this promise of support comes at a cost: Large, complex, or interconnected banks might take on more risk if they...

We consider the liquidity shock banks experienced following the collapse of the asset-backed commercial paper market in the fall of 2007 to investigate whether banks' liquidity condition affect their ability to provide liquidity to corporations. We find that banks that borrowed more from the...

We provide evidence that credit lines offer liquidity insurance to borrowers. Borrowers are able toextensively use their credit lines in recessions and ahead of credit line cuts. In fact drawdowns andchanges in drawdowns predict internal credit rating downgrades and credit line cuts,...