An Empirical Analysis on Board Monitoring Role and Loan Portfolio Quality Measurement in Banks

This paper aims to analyze the effectiveness of the board monitoring role on specific loan portfolio quality measures in banks (default rate, recovery rate and provisioning rate). We use a sample comprises a totality of Italian-based banks, listed at Borsa Italiana SpA in 2006-2008 and a number of accounting proxies to express the loan portfolio quality of a bank. The results of the analysis show an overall weakness of the board role (expressed by Independents and Audit Committee on board) in monitoring loan portfolio quality of the bank, with the subsequent damage of the interests of stakeholders. A positive contribution of board monitoring, even if partial, is highlighted in two cases: Independents seems improve recovery rate, while the Audit committee enhances provisioning rate in banks. With reference to default rate, a total negative effect of board monitoring is reported. On the base of these results, some managerial implications are proposed.Banks, Corporate governance, Board of directors, Loan Portfolio Quality

Ready for a digital Euro? Insights from a research agenda

Innovative tools—such as cryptocurrencies, electronic money, and digital payments—have enhanced the digitisation of financial system, but not without risk. To ensure financial stability and innovation, Central Banks have recently begun supporting the creation of so-called Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs). The present study reviews the literature around the digital transformation of the financial environment, with a specific focus on the creation of a digital Euro. A bibliometric analysis, conducted on 290 documents from the Scopus database, provides insights into the topic and its future research avenues. The results show a growing interest for CBDCs and their related issues, especially those related to the implementation of monetary policy instruments, which can hinge on issues related to the digital transformation of finance and innovation-related problems such as crime prevention and cybersecurity

Bank Size, Functional Distance and Loss Given Default Rate of Bank Loans

Most of the studies available on relationship lending focuses on the benefits for borrowers and neglects those achievable for banks. In particular, empirical studies on the benefits achieved for banks in terms of loans recovery rate, in connection with loss given default rate, are very few. In contrast, choosing the best approach to managing loans is crucial in the current credit market considering the high deterioration in quality of bank loans. This paper empirically tests whether the banks more oriented towards a relationship lending approach report a lower level of loss given default. Bank size and functional distance are used to measure the relationship lending approach in banks. This paper takes into account the Italian banking system and the effectiveness of their debt recovery processes during the 2005-2008 period. The data has been collected by ABI Banking Data and Bank of Italy. The empirical analysis highlights that banks more oriented in the relationship lending model have a greater capacity to recover bad loans. These findings have some managerial implications

An Empirical Analysis on Board Monitoring Role and Loan Portfolio Quality Measurement in Banks

This paper aims to analyze the effectiveness of the board monitoring role on specific loan portfolio quality measures in banks (default rate, recovery rate and provisioning rate). We use a sample comprises a totality of Italian-based banks, listed at Borsa Italiana SpA in 2006-2008 and a number of accounting proxies to express the loan portfolio quality of a bank. The results of the analysis show an overall weakness of the board role (expressed by Independents and Audit Committee on board) in monitoring loan portfolio quality of the bank, with the subsequent damage of the interests of stakeholders. A positive contribution of board monitoring, even if partial, is highlighted in two cases: Independents seems improve recovery rate, while the Audit committee enhances provisioning rate in banks. With reference to default rate, a total negative effect of board monitoring is reported. On the base of these results, some managerial implications are proposed

A questão da mobilidade urbana nas metrópoles brasileiras

O tempo de deslocamento de casa ao trabalho tem se elevado substancialmente nas regiões metropolitanas brasileiras durante a última década. Esse fenômeno tem implicações fortes sobre o bem-estar dos indivíduos, porém as consequências desse problema não se distribuem uniformemente entre a população. O presente trabalho visa contribuir para o debate sobre a questão da mobilidade urbana nas metrópoles brasileiras analisando a evolução do tempo de deslocamento entre 1992 e 2013 e suas diferenças de acordo com características do trabalhador, como sexo, cor e renda per capita, e do posto de trabalho. Verifica-se que o aumento do tempo médio de deslocamento ocorreu a partir de 2003, caracterizando uma questão particularmente importante para as metrópoles brasileiras no terceiro milênio. Os trabalhadores com maiores tempos médios de deslocamento residem nas regiões metropolitanas do Rio de Janeiro e de São Paulo. Entretanto, as maiores taxas de crescimento ocorreram nas metrópoles do Pará, Salvador e Recife, sugerindo a necessidade de melhor direcionamento e planejamento de políticas públicas na mobilidade urbana. Considerando as diferenças socioeconômicas, destaca-se que os mais pobres e os mais ricos (extremos da distribuição de renda) tendem a apresentar tempos de deslocamento menores do que os trabalhadores de famílias de renda média. Esse padrão se mantém ao longo do tempo, com aumento do tempo médio de deslocamento entre os mais pobres, mostrando uma face da desigualdade. Porém, o maior aumento ocorreu entre os mais ricos, colocando a questão da mobilidade urbana para além dos problemas de exclusão social.

Combined assessment of fluvial-marine sediment transport to determine the impact of coastal risks.

The study of morphological changes of a river channel, linked to erosion-deposition processes, taking place in the riverbed, is a topic of current interest in relation not only to the morphometric variations of the fluvial features (e.g., active channel width, area of sediment bars) and the sedimentary balance of the whole relative hydrographic basin but also in relation to the role of the sediment load transferred downstream up to the near shore area (Figure 1). These sediments constitute the solid transport that is pushed towards the coast and poured into the sea, representing a crucial sedimentary contribution to the beaches volumetric balance. The quantitative estimate of the volume of this fluvial load is currently achievable through robust approaches such as the morphological method grounded in the continuity principle applied to river sediments. To define the transport rates at selected locations (e.g., the river mouth) over a given time period, the method requires to measure the erosion and sedimentation volumes, which can be calculated using repeated Digital Elevation Models (DEM)and deriving a DEM of Difference (DoD) (Vericat et al., 2017; Capito et al., 2023). The coastal sedimentary balance is function of both the sediment load provided by rivers and the quantity of sediment transported by the longshore currents that move parallel to the coastline. For this reason, it is crucial to assess the impact of coastal erosion considering both the sediment input from the hydrographic basins and the longshore transport. Up to now there are no techniques capable of providing continuous and spatially distributed measurement of this sediment transfer, a fact of considerable interest if we think of the anthropic structures present along the shores, and the coast erosional problems. This study aims to evaluate, at the regional scale, the possibility of borrowing some techniques that are often used in fluvial contexts (e.g., geomorphological approach), to estimate the quantity of sediment that nourishes the coast. This information is essential as a preliminary step for further studies on the sediment transport process, considering, for instance, different climatic scenarios. A measured volume of sediments deposited over a specific time interval can be used to calibrate a physically-based sediment erosion and transport model, such as SMART-SED described by Gatti et al., 2023. Following calibration, the model can be employed to predict future scenarios by considering climate projections. An important aspect will be to assess the transferability of such methodologies taking into consideration the technical limitations (e.g., greater difficulty in acquiring bathymetric data in the submerged environment) and the morphodynamic differences of the two contexts (e.g., partial lack of lateral confinement of flows in the marine environment). Once it is established that meaningful estimates can be obtained, using the two solid transport estimates volumes (river and marine) it could be possible to obtain the budget of sediments that could benefit the near shore. This estimation certainly has a margin of error linked to all the uncertainties processes both in the river and coastal contexts, but it reveals an evaluation of sedimentary tendency of a coastal area: retreat, advancement or stationary. Today the studies of coastal balances certainly not considered the presence of submarine morphologies that favorthe sediments deposition (e.g., submerged bars and terraces) or the sediments removal (e.g., submarine canyons that arise very close to the coast) from near shore environment, significantly influencing the trend of longshore currents. In Italy there are many regions in which submarine canyons are very close to the coasts; these structures can act as collectors of sediments which are swallowed up towards greater depths (Lo Presti et al., 2022). Therefore, the quantitative study of sediment volume available on a near shore environment, linked to the presence of submarine morphologies favorable or not to the removal or stasis of sediments and to the intrinsic characteristic of the beach (e.g., long exposed beach, gulf, pocket beach), it constitutes a means of defining the sediment load that moves along a near shore area and which could influence and define possible scenarios of anthropic damage, as ports and fluvial bridges siltation but above coastal erosion risks

Opposite Response to Vitamin K Antagonists: A Report of Two Cases and Systematic Review of Literature

Vitamin K antagonists (VKAs) are used in the prophylaxis and treatment of thromboembolic disorders. Despite a high efficacy, their narrow therapeutic window and high response variability hamper their management. Several patients experience fluctuations in dose–response and are at increased risk of over- or under-anticoagulation. Therefore, it is essential to monitor the prothrombin time/international normalized ratio to determine the so-called stable dose and to adjust the dosage accordingly. Three polymorphisms, CYP2C9∗2, CYP2C9∗3 and VKORC1-1639G>A, are associated with increased sensitivity to VKAs. Other polymorphisms are associated with a request for a higher dose and VKA resistance. We described the clinical cases of two patients who were referred to the Clinical Pharmacology and Pharmacogenetics Unit of the University Hospital of Salerno for pharmacological counseling. One of them showed hypersensitivity and the other one was resistant to VKAs. A systematic review was performed to identify randomized clinical trials investigating the impact of pharmacogenetic testing on increased sensitivity and resistance to VKAs. Although international guidelines are available and information on the genotype-guided dosing approach has been included in VKA drug labels, VKA pharmacogenetic testing is not commonly required. The clinical cases and the results of the systematically reviewed RCTs demonstrate that the pharmacogenetic-based VKA dosing model represents a valuable resource for reducing VKA-associated adverse events

Maternal Oct-4 is a potential key regulator of the developmental competence of mouse oocytes

Background The maternal contribution of transcripts and proteins supplied to the zygote is crucial for the progression from a gametic to an embryonic control of preimplantation development. Here we compared the transcriptional profiles of two types of mouse MII oocytes, one which is developmentally competent (MIISN oocyte), the other that ceases development at the 2-cell stage (MIINSN oocyte), with the aim of identifying genes and gene expression networks whose misregulated expression would contribute to a reduced developmental competence. Results We report that: 1) the transcription factor Oct-4 is absent in MIINSN oocytes, accounting for 2) the down-regulation of Stella, a maternal-effect factor required for the oocyte-to-embryo transition and of which Oct-4 is a positive regulator; 3) eighteen Oct-4-regulated genes are up-regulated in MIINSN oocytes and are part of gene expression networks implicated in the activation of adverse biochemical pathways such as oxidative phosphorylation, mitochondrial dysfunction and apoptosis. Conclusion The down-regulation of Oct-4 plays a crucial function in a sequence of molecular processes that leads to the developmental arrest of MIINSN oocytes. The use of a model study in which the MII oocyte ceases development consistently at the 2-cell stage has allowed to attribute a role to the maternal Oct-4 that has never been described before. Oct-4 emerges as a key regulator of the molecular events that govern the establishment of the developmental competence of mouse oocytes