The impact of monetary policy and its surprises on bank’s risk-taking

The latest financial crisis accentuated the importance of understanding bank risk and its ties to financial stability. This paper looks to investigate the impact of monetary policy in the risk-taking behaviour of Euro Area banks, when taking unconventional monetary policy into account. Looking further into this relationship, the impact of unanticipated monetary policy shocks is also analysed. Using both fixed effects and a system GMM model, sufficient statistical evidence was found to claim that looser monetary policy leads to increased risk-taking behaviour from banks. This effect, however, is mitigated in case banks and/or the market originally anticipated an even looser stance by the central bank

Characterisation of microbial attack on archaeological bone

As part of an EU funded project to investigate the factors influencing bone preservation in the archaeological record, more than 250 bones from 41 archaeological sites in five countries spanning four climatic regions were studied for diagenetic alteration. Sites were selected to cover a range of environmental conditions and archaeological contexts. Microscopic and physical (mercury intrusion porosimetry) analyses of these bones revealed that the majority (68%) had suffered microbial attack. Furthermore, significant differences were found between animal and human bone in both the state of preservation and the type of microbial attack present. These differences in preservation might result from differences in early taphonomy of the bones. © 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved