Banking Industry Consolidation: Past Changes and Implications for the Future

Because there was a 25 percent reduction in the number of banks between 1980 and 1993, the popular impression has been one of a "shrinking" banking industry. Daniel Nolle challenges this view by dissecting the complexity of banking consolidation, particularly given the radical structural changes in commercial banking since 1980. While increased consolidation can be accounted for by heightened competitive pressures that force banks to look for cost savings, greater revenues, or quality improvements via mergers, it has also been stimulated by recent changes in state laws that restricted geographic expansion of banking. The data shows that from 1980 to 1993, 5,202 banks disappeared through mergers, which was three and one-half times the 1,456 banks that failed. The majority of mergers were "intramergers" (within the same holding company), but the number of "intermergers" (between unafiliated banks) has also risen over the past several years. It is Nolle's conclusion that a review of the data on nation-wide trends in banking company structure reveals a complex story I which the distinction between OSMBHCs and MSMBHCs is significant. The whole question of what form of corporate organization banking companies choose is complicated by differences in state banking laws, differences in interstate banking laws, and differences in the pace at which those laws have been changed over this period of time. Such consolidation is expected to continue, especially given increased competition and an expansion of geographic powers. As the twenty-first century approaches, we can expect there to be thousands of banks and thousands of bank holding companies.

Family relationships and Latina teen suicide attempts: Reciprocity, asymmetry, and detachment

Using qualitative data collected from adolescent Latinas and their parents, this article describes ways in which family relationships are organized within low-income Latino families (n = 24) with and without a daughter who attempted suicide. Based on a family-level analysis approach, we present a framework that categorizes relationships as reciprocal, asymmetrical, or detached. Clear differences are identified: Families of nonattempters primarily cluster in reciprocal families, whereas families with an adolescent suicide attempter exhibit characteristics of asymmetrical or detached families. Our results highlight the need for detailed clinical attention to family communication patterns, especially in Latino families. Clinicians may reduce the likelihood of an attempt or repeated attempts by raising mutual, reciprocal exchanges of words and support between parents and daughter

Family relationships and Latina teen suicide attempts: Reciprocity, asymmetry, and detachment

Using qualitative data collected from adolescent Latinas and their parents, this article describes ways in which family relationships are organized within low-income Latino families (n = 24) with and without a daughter who attempted suicide. Based on a family-level analysis approach, we present a framework that categorizes relationships as reciprocal, asymmetrical, or detached. Clear differences are identified: Families of nonattempters primarily cluster in reciprocal families, whereas families with an adolescent suicide attempter exhibit characteristics of asymmetrical or detached families. Our results highlight the need for detailed clinical attention to family communication patterns, especially in Latino families. Clinicians may reduce the likelihood of an attempt or repeated attempts by raising mutual, reciprocal exchanges of words and support between parents and daughter

Structural and magnetic deconvolution of FePt/FeOx-nanoparticles using x-ray magnetic circular dichroism

Recently, magnetite nanoparticles have attracted much attention, due to their technological potential based on different optic, magnetic and catalytic sections. In particular, the magnetic properties of hybrid nanocrystals can be tailored by the combination of complementary magnetic materials like for example magnetite and FePt. In order to analyse the related magnetic and structural properties of the resulting bi-component systems, we present x-ray absorption and x-ray magnetic circular dichroism studies at the Fe L2,3 edges simultaneously performed in total electron yield and transmission mode, done at room and low temperatures. This provides in particular the separation of volume- and surface-related properties. The investigated system was made up of FePt/FeOx hybrid nanocrystals, which could be uniquely tuned in size and volume ratios. These measurements have been combined with magnetometry and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy studies. The separation between surface and bulk has been done by a deconvolution of the absorption spectra in terms of a linear superposition of reference spectra. With this universally applicable technique we are able to experimentally determine that the outer FeOx shell fraction at the surface has a strongly reduced magnetization and is of maghemite character, while the inner part is more magnetite like. So the technique shown here can be used to characterize nanoparticular systems and determine their structural and magnetic properties

Collective Particle Flow through Random Media

A simple model for the nonlinear collective transport of interacting particles in a random medium with strong disorder is introduced and analyzed. A finite threshold for the driving force divides the behavior into two regimes characterized by the presence or absence of a steady-state particle current. Below this threshold, transient motion is found in response to an increase in the force, while above threshold the flow approaches a steady state with motion only on a network of channels which is sparse near threshold. Some of the critical behavior near threshold is analyzed via mean field theory, and analytic results on the statistics of the moving phase are derived. Many of the results should apply, at least qualitatively, to the motion of magnetic bubble arrays and to the driven motion of vortices in thin film superconductors when the randomness is strong enough to destroy the tendencies to lattice order even on short length scales. Various history dependent phenomena are also discussed.Comment: 63 preprint pages plus 6 figures. Submitted to Phys Rev

Static and Dynamic Properties of Inhomogeneous Elastic Media on Disordered Substrate

The pinning of an inhomogeneous elastic medium by a disordered substrate is studied analytically and numerically. The static and dynamic properties of a $D$-dimensional system are shown to be equivalent to those of the well known problem of a $D$-dimensional random manifold embedded in $(D+D)$-dimensions. The analogy is found to be very robust, applicable to a wide range of elastic media, including those which are amorphous or nearly-periodic, with local or nonlocal elasticity. Also demonstrated explicitly is the equivalence between the dynamic depinning transition obtained at a constant driving force, and the self-organized, near-critical behavior obtained by a (small) constant velocity drive.Comment: 20 pages, RevTeX. Related (p)reprints also available at http://matisse.ucsd.edu/~hwa/pub.htm

Stochastic Growth Equations and Reparametrization Invariance

It is shown that, by imposing reparametrization invariance, one may derive a variety of stochastic equations describing the dynamics of surface growth and identify the physical processes responsible for the various terms. This approach provides a particularly transparent way to obtain continuum growth equations for interfaces. It is straightforward to derive equations which describe the coarse grained evolution of discrete lattice models and analyze their small gradient expansion. In this way, the authors identify the basic mechanisms which lead to the most commonly used growth equations. The advantages of this formulation of growth processes is that it allows one to go beyond the frequently used no-overhang approximation. The reparametrization invariant form also displays explicitly the conservation laws for the specific process and all the symmetries with respect to space-time transformations which are usually lost in the small gradient expansion. Finally, it is observed, that the knowledge of the full equation of motion, beyond the lowest order gradient expansion, might be relevant in problems where the usual perturbative renormalization methods fail.Comment: 42 pages, Revtex, no figures. To appear in Rev. of Mod. Phy