Search Results
Journal Article
Lack of competition: where it's found and how much it costs
Working Paper
The competitive implications of multimarket bank branching
Regulators and research economists typically view retail banking markets as locally limited, spanning an area that can often be approximated by a metropolitan area or a rural county. Banks are assumed to set retail prices based on the conditions of supply and demand prevailing within these local market areas. However, recent studies have found evidence that large, multimarket banking organizations tend to offer uniform interest rates for retail deposit accounts of a particular type throughout the area that they serve, at least within a given state. This uniform pricing phenomenon raises ...
Working Paper
Acquisition targets and motives in the banking industry
This paper uses a large sample of individual banking organizations, observed from 1996 to 2003, to investigate the characteristics that made them more likely to be acquired. We use a definition of acquisition that we consider preferable to that used in much of the previous literature, and we employ a competing-risk hazard model that reveals important differences that depend on the type of acquirer. Since interstate acquisitions became more numerous during this period, we also investigate differences in the determinants of acquisition between in-state and out-of-state acquirers. The hypothesis ...
Working Paper
Recent trends in the number and size of bank branches: an examination of likely determinants
In this paper, we examine the role of market characteristics in explaining the much discussed phenomenon of growth in the number of banking institution branches over time, and the much less discussed phenomenon of decline in the size of the average branch. We note first that substitution of bank branches in the US for thrift branches accounts for much of the sharp rise observed for bank branches over time. Using a panel data set that consists of over 2,000 markets observed from 1988 to 2004, we report a number of findings regarding the market characteristics that are associated with the ...
Working Paper
The impact of credit unions on the rates offered for retail deposits by banks and thrift institutions
Because of the increasing significance of credit unions as potential competitors for consumer deposits, this paper examines the impact of the market presence of credit unions, variously measured, on the rates for three different types of consumer deposits offered by banks and thrift institutions. In contrast to previous studies, the sample employed covers the nation as a whole, incorporates all large urban areas, and employs survey data on deposit rates for a substantially larger number of institutions than previously employed. Despite circumstance that are argued to militate against the ...
Working Paper
Multimarket bank pricing: an empirical investigation of deposit interest rates
In recent years, the number of large, geographically diversified banking organizations operating in the U.S. has grown. Empirical studies have found that, at least in the case of deposit interest rates, many of these banks offer the same rate for a given type of account throughout a state, or, in some cases, a broader geographical area. This phenomenon of uniform pricing raises questions as to what competitive factors are relevant in explaining the deposit interest rates offered by large multimarket banks. In this paper, we provide empirical evidence regarding the determinants of the deposit ...