The role of screening and cross-selling in bank-firm relationships

This paper presents a monopolistic competition model of a bank choosing the optimal level of the screening effort in the presence of cross-selling activities. We demonstrate that, in absence of informational synergies, the larger is the range of services that the bank produces, the lower is the optimal screening effort. The paper also analyses the impact of competition in the lending market on cross-selling activities and finds that, for sufficiently low levels of transportation costs, an increase in competition in the lending market increases the expected profitability of services, thus increasing banks’ incentives to engage in cross-selling activities.Policy games, policy effectiveness, controllability, Nash equilibrium existence, rational expectations

The role of banks as producers of information: can it survive competition and cross-selling incentives

This paper studies the impact of competition on lending behaviour and cross-selling incentives of banks in a spatial competition model of the banking sector where positively evaluated loan applicants are more likely to buy other services from their lending bank. Overall our model suggests that the more competition increases in the loan market, the more the banking system is encouraged to move towards non-traditional activities and the less credit is information-based. This undesired effect of competition in the loan market may have contributed in the past to the excessive risk-taking behaviour of European banks and could hamper the stability of the financial system in the future

Risultati sportivi e performance di borsa nel calcio europeo

Introduzione – 1. Calcio e borsa – 2. Indici di borsa e calcio: l’indice Dow Jones Stoxx Football – 3. Il legame tra borsa e risultati agonistici – 4. Le squadre e gli incontri nella nostra analisi – 5. La relazione tra risultati in campo e andamento del titolo delle squadre – 6. Correlazione tra risultati agonistici, titoli delle squadre e Dow Jones Stoxx Football – 7. Le stime – Considerazioni conclusivesport, risultati agonistici, performance di borsa, calcio, UEFA Champions League

Divari di sviluppo e politica infrastrutturale: il ruolo delle autostrade

Il saggio si concentra sul settore dei trasporti, discutendo le evidenze empiriche disponibili sul ruolo dello sviluppo locale nelle diverse regioni italiane. Sulle base delle loro analisi, gli autori concludono che una politica infrastrutturale che tenga conto delle specificità locali e della distribuzione degli investimenti tra le diverse regioni potrebbe avere significativi effetti nel ridurre i divari tra le aree del Paese

MULTIPLE BANKING RELATIONSHIPS AND OVER-LEVERAGE IN ITALIAN MANUFACTURING FIRMS

The purpose of this paper is to shed more light on the determinants of the number of bank lending relationships. In particular we look at the link between over-leverage and the number of banking relationships for a sample of Italian manufacturing firms, distinguishing between firms with a main bank and firms without a main bank. The main result of the paper is that the number of banking relationships increases with over-leverage only for firms without a main bank. We argue that this result is consistent with the view that, when banks perform transaction lending, firms can increase their debt capacity by increasing the number of creditors, promising ex ante up to the full amount of available assets to each one of the creditors. Copyright � 2006 The Authors; Journal compilation � 2006 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and The University of Manchester.

European banks and cross-selling

According to a part of economic literature, the growing competition among financial intermediaries, together with the consequent interest margin shrink, induced many banks to enter new markets and adopt cross-selling strategies. Our results show that two kinds of banks coexist in Europe: cross-selling banks, more interested in 'depositors' than in loans, and traditional banks, interested in granting loans to good borrowers. The awareness of the deep difference existing between these two types of banks now operating in Europe is very important for the implementation of an effective economic policy in the face of the financial crisis. We find evidence that cross-selling banks tend to be localized in countries where the banking system is less concentrated but they are not characterized by lower interest margins.

Relationship lending and innovation: empirical evidence on a sample of European firms

This paper investigates the impact of relationship lending on innovation (the probability to innovate and the intensity of innovation). Using a unique dataset providing detailed information on bank\u2013firm relationships across European firms, we relate different proxies of relationship lending (soft information, long-lasting relationships, number of banks and share of the main bank) to innovation. We find a very strong and robust positive effect of \u2018soft-information-intensive\u2019 relationships, a less robust positive effect of long-lasting relationships and a negative effect of credit concentration as measured by the number of banking relationships. We also find that \u2018soft-information-intensive\u2019 relationships reduce credit rationing for innovative firms, while long-lasting relationships seem to favour innovation via other relational channels. These results raise some concern on the impact of screening processes based on automatic procedures, as those suggested by the Basel rules, on firms' capability to finance innovative activities in Europe

A spatial analysis of growth and convergence in Italian provinces: the role of road infrastructure

<p>A spatial analysis of growth and convergence in Italian provinces: the role of road infrastructure. <i>Regional Studies</i>. The role of road infrastructure in reducing economic disparities is debated in both Europe and the United States. During the 1960s, huge investments in highways significantly reduced the time run between north and south Italy. A spatial analysis of convergence is performed. Results show that the effect of road infrastructure investment was significant but accompanied by a strong polarization between north and south (also emerging from non-parametric analysis) that it failed to prevent, possibly because investment in the south was not large enough to close the accessibility gap with the centre–north, a gap that appears to persist during the subsequent years.</p