The transition of banking in Central and Eastern Europe was nothing short of remarkable. All these countries now have market oriented banking systems that are largely free of government influence. This success is often attributed to the influence of foreign banks that brought modern technology...

In this paper we examine the role of syndicated loan markets in financial market development in 24 European countries. We find credit spreads to be negatively related to market size in small markets and positively related in large financial markets. Syndicated loans play a different role in...