Nonbank Lending Research Articles

Can the U.S. Interbank Market be Revived?

Large-scale asset purchases by the Federal Reserve as well as new Basel III banking regulations have led to important changes in U.S. money markets. Most notably the interbank market has essentially disappeared with the dramatic increase in excess reserves held by banks. We build a model in the tradition of Poole (1968) to study whether interbank market activity can be revived if the supply of excess reserves is decreased sufficiently. We show that it may not be possible to revive the market to pre-crisis volumes due to costs associated with recent banking regulations. Although the volume of interbank trading may initially increase as excess reserves continue to decline, the new regulations may engender changes in market structure that result in interbank trading being completely replaced by non-bank lending to banks when excess reserves become scarce. This non-monotonic response of interbank trading volume to reductions in excess reserves may lead to misleading forecasts about future fed funds prices and quantities when/if the Fed begins to normalize their balance sheet by reducing excess reserves.

Non-Bank Lending to Firms: Evidence from Korean Firm-Level Data

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to examine the determinants of non-bank depository institutions (non-bank financial corporations) lending to firms. The paper aims to contribute to the existing literature by providing empirical evidence from firm-level data and unveiling factors related to access to non-bank financial corporations by firms. Research design, data, and methodology - We used the data on borrowing by firms from CRETOP from years 2008 to 2011. Using the manufacturing industry, we examined what firm-level characteristics explained the increase in borrowing from non-bank financial corporations rather than the banks. Results - Analyzing the firm-level data from 2008 to 2011, we found that firms were more likely to borrow from non-bank financial insti­tutions as the size of the firm increases, implying that large firms have more access to non-bank financing than small and medium-sized firms. In addition, it also showed that small and medium-sized firms moved to non-bank financial corporations for loans. Conclusion - Non-bank depository institutions are not a sub­stitute for bank lending to firms. More specifically, they replace bank lending to firms mostly for large firms rather than small and medium-sized firms. Also, collateral and other firm-level characteristics do not matter in accounting for non-bank lending to firms.

The international transmission of monetary policy

This paper presents the novel results from an internationally coordinated project by the International Banking Research Network (IBRN) on the cross-border transmission of conventional and unconventional monetary policy through banks. Teams from seventeen countries use confidential micro-banking data for the years 2000 through 2015 to explore the international transmission of monetary policies of the United States, euro area, Japan, and United Kingdom. Two other studies use international data with different degrees of granularity. International spillovers into lending to the private sector do occur, especially for US policies, and bank-specific heterogeneity influences the magnitudes of transmission. The effects are supportive of the international bank lending channel and the portfolio channel of monetary policy transmission. They also show that the frictions that banks face matter; in particular, foreign currency funding and hedging considerations can be a key source of heterogeneity. The forms of bank balance sheet heterogeneity that differentiate spillovers across banks are not uniform across countries. International spillovers into lending can be large for some banks, even while the average international spillovers of policies into nonbank lending generally are not large.

The International Transmission of Monetary Policy

This paper presents the novel results from an internationally coordinated project by the International Banking Research Network (IBRN) on the cross-border transmission of conventional and unconventional monetary policy through banks. Teams from seventeen countries use confidential micro-banking data for the years 2000 through 2015 to explore the international transmission of monetary policies of the U.S., euro area, Japan, and United Kingdom. Two other studies use international data with different degrees of granularity. International spillovers into lending to the private sector do occur, especially for U.S. policies, and bank-specific heterogeneity influences the magnitudes of transmission. The effects are supportive of the international bank lending channel and the portfolio channel of monetary policy transmission. They also show that the frictions that banks face matter; in particular, foreign currency funding and hedging considerations can be a key source of heterogeneity. The forms of bank balance sheet heterogeneity that differentiate spillovers across banks are not uniform across countries. International spillovers into lending can be large for some banks, even while the average international spillovers of policies into nonbank lending generally are not large.

Does Lending by banks and non-banks differ? Evidence from small business financing

Non-bank loans to corporate businesses have shown a dramatic increase compared to bank loans. Despite the increasing importance of non-bank lending, the differences between loans made by different types of lenders are mostly unknown. To uncover the distinctions, the author investigates whether bank and non-bank financial institutions deal differently with information scarcity of small firms by introducing lender-borrower distance as a proxy for information availability. Using the National Survey of Small Business Finances (NSSBF) provided by the Federal Reserve Board, estimate the loan approval probability models after controlling for various borrower characteristics. The NSSBF data is collected by using stratified sampling to ensure sufficient numbers of observations for minority-owned firms. To circumvent potential bias due to the sampling method, the author follows the approach suggested by Wooldridge (1999) and estimates a weighted maximum likelihood estimation to adjust for sampling design. This paper establishes novel evidence supporting the notion that banks and non-bank financial institutions are different in their ability to deal with information scarcity. Bank loan approval probability decreases as distance to their borrowers increases, while its effect on non-bank loan approval probability is statistically insignificant, supporting the notion that non-bank lending is different from bank lending in dealing with information asymmetry.

What is Shadow Banking?

There is much confusion about what shadow banking is. Some equate it with securitization, others with non-traditional bank activities, and yet others with non-bank lending. Regardless, most think of shadow banking as activities that can create systemic risk. This paper proposes to describe shadow banking as “all financial activities, except traditional banking, which require a private or public backstop to operate”. Backstops can come in the form of franchise value of a bank or insurance company, or in the form of a government guarantee. The need for a backstop is in our view a crucial feature of shadow banking, which distinguishes it from the “usual” intermediated capital market activities, such as custodians, hedge funds, leasing companies, etc.

On a Tight Leash: Does Bank Organisational Structure Matter for Macroprudential Spillovers?

This paper examines whether cross-border spillovers of macroprudential regulation depend on the organisational structure of banks’ foreign affiliates. Our analysis compares the response of foreign banks’ branches versus subsidiaries in the United Kingdom to changes in macroprudential regulations in foreign banks’ home countries. By focusing on branches and subsidiaries of the same banking group, we are able to control for all the factors affecting parent banks’ decisions regarding the lending of their foreign affiliates. We document that there are important differences between the type of regulation and the type of lending. Following a tightening of capital regulation, branches of multinational banks reduce interbank lending growth by 6 percentage points more relative to subsidiaries of the same banking group. Lending to non-banks does not exhibit such differences. A tightening in lending standards or reserve requirements at home does not have differential effects on both interbank and non-bank lending in the United Kingdom.

What is Shadow Banking?

There is much confusion about what shadow banking is. Some equate it with securitization, others with non-traditional bank activities, and yet others with non-bank lending. Regardless, most think of shadow banking as activities that can create systemic risk. This paper proposes to describe shadow banking as “all financial activities, except traditional banking, which require a private or public backstop to operate”. Backstops can come in the form of franchise value of a bank or insurance company, or in the form of a government guarantee. The need for a backstop is in our view a crucial feature of shadow banking, which distinguishes it from the “usual” intermediated capital market activities, such as custodians, hedge funds, leasing companies, etc.

Advantages and Opportunities of Ireland for CLO Issuers, Structured Finance, and Non-Bank Lending

As an onshore, EU, and OECD member state with an extensive double tax treaty network and with its special tax regime for special purpose vehicles (SPVs), Ireland has emerged as a favored location for establishing vehicles to invest in or hold a wide variety of financial assets, including distressed assets. In particular, Ireland has become a domicile of choice for onshore SPVs in Europe, and it is a preferred alternative to the traditional offshore SPV jurisdictions. Irish SPVs have been used for plain-vanilla securitizations, collateralized loan obligations (CLOs) repackaging of receivables, mortgages, loans (both performing and non-performing), less straightforward synthetic transactions, and more unusual securitizations involving infrastructure projects, such as toll roads. They are also used in various other structures, such as aircraft leasing, life settlement issues, and regulated fund structures.

The Impact of Non-Bank Lending on Mergers and Acquisitions

Evidence shows that nonbanks, which are now significant participants in the corporate loan market, exploit information gained from lending to trade in public securities. We examine whether these institutions use loan-based information to facilitate merger and acquisition (M&A) deals. We find that firms are significantly more likely to become targets if they borrow from nonbanks rather than banks. Borrowing from a larger number of nonbanks or from those with a sizeable client network also enhances a firm’s acquisition prospects. When nonbanks gain more information about borrowers through loan amendments or multiple loans, the impact of nonbank lending grows stronger. We also identify three channels that might allow nonbanks to exploit loan-based information in the M&A market.

The Impact of Nonbank Lending on Mergers and Acquisitions

The Impact of Nonbank Lending on Mergers and Acquisitions