The evolution of credit terms : an empirical study of commercial bank lending to developing countries

This paper studies changes in spreads on bank loans to developing countries during 1968-81. It found that a borrower's experience had a significant impact on spreads. Spreads started at high values at low levels of loan experience and decreased as experience increased. Spreads at initial-experience levels were about 30 percent above benchmark, with experience. The impact of experience became negligible with 30 prior loans. The paper also suggests that a greater role for international organizations in collecting and disseminating information about potential borrowers. Indeed, international institutions have been doing more of this fact-finding since the onset of the debt crisis.Financial Intermediation,Economic Theory&Research,Banks&Banking Reform,Economic Adjustment and Lending,Environmental Economics&Policies

Have commercial banks ignored history?

What incentives do countries have to repay loans? Do banks credibly punish borrowers that behave badly - and if so, how? Two explanations are commonly offered for why countries repay debts: (a) to preserve their reputation as a good borrower; or (b) to avoid direct sanctions, such as trade sanctions or the seizure of overseas assets. The author empirically investigated the effect of repayment problems in earlier eras on the spreads paid by developing country borrowers in the 1970s. She found that creditor banks did take account of borrowers'default histories. Defaulters paid higher spreads than nondefaulters, and the defaulters that reneged on large portions of their past debt paid higher spreads. She also found that countries that acquired sovereignty more recently were charged higher spreads than other countries. These findings apply during an expansionist period. During an earlier crisis stage, markets failed to discriminate between borrowers that"behaved badly"and those that did not.Strategic Debt Management,Banks&Banking Reform,Financial Intermediation,Economic Theory&Research,Environmental Economics&Policies

Debt concentration and secondary market prices

Using a model that distinguishes between large money center banks and smaller regional banks, this paper shows that the percentage of a country's debt held by the large banks affects the secondary market price of that country's debt: the higher the concentration of the debt, the higher the secondary market price. It also shows that if debt is freely traded in the secondary market, the entire stock of debt will not eventually end up being owned by the large banks. The authors'empirical analysis incorporates several potential determinants of secondary market prices: variables associated with a country's economic performance, variables that can be associated with the creditor country's regulatory structure, and the concentration of debt in the hands of the largest U.S. banks.Banks&Banking Reform,Financial Intermediation,Economic Theory&Research,Financial Crisis Management&Restructuring,Environmental Economics&Policies

The impact of economics blogs

There is a proliferation of economics blogs, with increasing numbers of economists attracting large numbers of readers, yet little is known about the impact of this new medium. Using a variety of experimental and non-experimental techniques, this study quantifies some of their effects. First, links from blogs cause a striking increase in the number of abstract views and downloads of economics papers. Second, blogging raises the profile of the blogger (and his or her institution) and boosts their reputation above economists with similar publication records. Finally, a blog can transform attitudes about some of the topics it covers.Tertiary Education,E-Business,Economic Theory&Research,Information Security&Privacy,Agricultural Knowledge&Information Systems

Bank Exposure, Capital and Secondary Market Discounts on the Developing Country Debt

Previous empirical studies of secondary market discounts for developing countries have ignored important creditor country factors. The empirical evidence in this paper indicates that, after controlling for repayment indicators of borrower countries, bank exposure and capital are important determinants of secondary market discounts: an increase in the exposure of large banks to a particular country leads to a decrease in the secondary market discounts on the debt of that country, while an increase in the capital of large banks leads to an increase in secondary market discounts. Among the repayment indicators of developing countries, only debt ratios are found to be significant determinants of the discounts. We suggest that the impacts of exposure and capital can be explained by the presence of deposit insurance. The evidence presented on the stock market pricing of lender banks supports this view.

Does foreign ownership matter for survival and growth? Dynamics of competition and foreign direct investment

Foreign direct investment has been considered for a long time as an important channel for transfer of technology to developing countries, and an important tool to generate jobs in those countries. Multinationals bring the factor that developing countries need most, capital, and therefore, they may also help to ease the unemployment pressure created by a rapidly growing (urban) population. It is shown by many researchers that foreign establishments are much more productive than domestic firms, but the empirical evidence regarding technology spillovers is not unambiguous. In this paper, we suggest that the impact of foreign direct investment on local industry hinges on the dynamics of foreign and domestic establishments, i.e., entry, selection (exit), and growth processes. Our analysis on foreign and domestic establishments in Turkish manufacturing industry for the period 1983-96 indicates that foreign establishments have a better performance level than domestic ones when they are first established in the local market, and have a higher survival probability. However, when the establishment characteristics are controlled for, domestic establishments have the same survival probability, but achieve lower rates of employment growth in the early post-entry period.Turkey, foreign direct investment, firm dynamics, entry, exit, growth

History Matters for the Export Decision Plant Level Evidence from Turkish Manufacturing Industry

In a dynamic panel data framework, we investigate the factors influencing the export decision of the Turkish manufacturing plants over the 1990-2001 period. Our results support the presence of high sunk costs of entry to export markets, as well as the hypothesis that the full history of export participation matters for the current export decision. We further show that the effect of the past export experience on current export decision rapidly depreciates over time: Recent export market participation matters more than the participation further in the past. Finally, we show that while persistence in exporting helps lower the costs of re-entry today, there are diminishing returns to export experience. Our results are robust to plant characteristics (plant size, technology, composition of the employment), the spillovers from the presence of exporters in the same industry, as well as industry and year effects.Export decision, productivity, sunk costs, plant characteristics

How factors in creditor countries affect secondary market prices for developing country debt

Bank loans to many developing countries trade at a discount on the secondary market. These discounts are typically assumed to reflect only the repayment prospects of the borrower country. But the authors demonstrate that factors in the creditor countries have a major impact on secondary market prices. Their empirical investigation suggests a systematic relationship between secondary market prices and the size distribution of banks'portfolios. There is a strong negative correlation between discounts in the secondary market and U.S. banks'heavy exposure to developing country debt. It is estimated that every US$4 billion increase in a large bank's exposure to a country reduces the discount 10 to 15 cents on the dollar. The authors find that discounts and total bank capital are positively correlated over time : a US$8 billion increase in the capital of the largest U.S. banks increases discounts by nearly 25 cents on the dollar. They explain their results with a simulation model of a representative bank with minimum capital requirements, flat-rate deposit insurance, and limited liability. The bank's portfolio adjustment decision involves trading risky foreign loans in the secondary market or making short-term domestic loans. The model yields a negative relationship between the banks'exposure to developing countries and discounts in the secondary market.Banks&Banking Reform,Financial Intermediation,Economic Theory&Research,Environmental Economics&Policies,Financial Crisis Management&Restructuring

External Debt and Political Instability

This paper studies theoretically and empirically the role of domestic political incentives in the accumulation of large external debts by developing countries during 1972-81. The theoretical model characterizes two equilibrium regimes. In one regime the borrower is on its demand curve and changes in the loan size demand are accommodated by the lenders. In the other regime the borrower is credit rationed, and the loan size is determined by the perceived country risk. Higher political instability increases the equilibrium loan size in the first regime and decreases it in the second. Using out-of-sample of evidence, we identify the two regimes in the data. We then find that in the unconstrained regime political instability has a significant positive effect on the loan size, whereas it has no significant effect in the credit rationing regime. Hence the evidence indicates a positive effect of political instability on the demand for sovereign loans, as predicted by the theory.