Search Results
Journal Article
Profits and balance sheet developments at U.S. commercial banks in 2000
The profitability of the U.S. commercial banking industry remained robust in 2000, but returns on equity and on commercial bank assets fell back somewhat from the peak reached in 1999. The falloff reflected a continuation of the decline in net interest margin that dates from the extraordinarily high levels of the early 1990s, a significant increase in loan-loss provisions, and a notable slowing in noninterest income growth. The expansion of bank balance sheets was much stronger in 2000 than in the preceding year, as growth of both loans and securities accelerated. The pickup in loan growth ...
Working Paper
Estimating changes in supervisory standards and their economic effects
The disappointingly slow recovery in the U.S. from the recent recession and financial crisis has once again focused attention on the relationship between financial frictions and economic growth. With bank loans having only recently started growing and still sluggish, some bankers and borrowers have suggested that unnecessarily tight supervisory policies have been a constraint on new lending that is hindering recovery. This paper explores one specific aspect of supervisory policy: whether the standards used to assign commercial bank CAMELS ratings have changed materially over time (1991-2011). ...
Journal Article
Profits and balance sheet developments at U.S. commercial banks in 2007
Reviews recent developments in the balance sheets and in the profitability of U.S. commercial banks. The article discusses how developments in the U.S. banking industry in 2007 and early 2008 were related to changes in financial markets and in the broader economy.
Discussion Paper
Relation Between Levels and Changes in Lending Standards Reported by Banks in the Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices
This note uses bank-level answers to the Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices (SLOOS) to investigate the relation between levels and changes in lending standards reported by banks. We provide evidence that banks' responses about levels and changes in standards are positively correlated, although this relationship is not clear in summary statistics. These results suggest that banks’ responses to the quarterly SLOOS questions and their annual counterparts contain independent information about their lending practices.
Working Paper
Medicaid's nursing home coverage and asset transfers
Medicaid covers the costs of a long nursing home stay. This coverage may create an incentive for the elderly to transfer their assets to their children in order to qualify for Medicaid before entering a nursing home. Previous researchers had found little evidence that such behavior was widespread or that asset transfers were large. However, data from AHEAD suggest that the self-assessed probability of entering a nursing home is a significant determinant of the likelihood of making an asset transfer. The budgetary implications of these Medicaid-induced asset transfers are probably fairly ...
Journal Article
Risk management by structured derivative product companies
In the early 1990s, some U.S. securities firms and foreign banks began creating subsidiary vehicles--known as structured derivative product companies (DPCs)--whose special risk management approaches enabled them to obtain triple-A credit ratings with the least amount of capital. At first, market observers expected credit-sensitive customers to turn increasingly to these DPCs. However, the authors find that structured DPCs--despite their superior ratings--have failed to live up to their initial promise and have yet to gain a competitive edge as intermediaries in the derivatives markets.
Working Paper
Enhancing Stress Tests by Adding Macroprudential Elements
The use of stress testing for macroprudential objectives is advanced by modeling spillovers within the financial sector or between the real and financial sectors. In this chapter, we discuss several macroprudential elements that capture these spillovers and how they might be added to stress test frameworks. We show how funding spillovers can be modeled as an add-on, using a reduced-form relation between banks' funding cost, bank capital and economic activity. Using a calibration to US data, we project very modest funding spillovers conditional on the DFAST 2018 severely adverse scenario. ...
Journal Article
Profits and balance sheet developments at U.S. commercial banks in 1999
The U.S. commercial banking industry posted record earnings in 1999. The industry's return on assets and return on equity both rose above the already high level of recent years. Profitability was concentrated at large banks--particularly among the 100 largest--and was driven upward by a surge in noninterest income and a significant slowdown in the growth of noninterest expense. Other sources of improved profitability were a stabilization of net interest income, which had been weakening in recent years, and lower loan loss provisioning permitted by generally good asset quality. The growth of ...