Market Competition and Bank Capital

在上一次金融危机期间，银行资本已被证明对银行的韧性、业绩，以及最重要的，在危机时期的贷款供应至关重要。作为对危机的回应，政策制定者提高了所有银行的最低资本充足率要求，对具有系统重要性的银行的提高幅度甚至更大。鉴于银行资本的重要性及其对金融稳定的积极影响，了解银行资本比率的决定因素以及其他监管或政策应对措施对银行资本比率可能产生的无意间接影响至关重要。在这个项目中，我们的目标是通过研究以下问题来促进这一讨论：1)信贷市场竞争加剧对银行资本比率的影响是什么？2)银行资本的增加是否会改变银行的贷款组合？当银行的资本增加时，它们是否会减少独立贷款，增加关系贷款？3)持有更高的资本比率是否会使银行在当地存款市场上获得竞争优势？在我们项目的第一部分中，我们的目标是了解当这些银行活跃的市场中的信贷市场竞争发生变化时，银行是否会调整其资本比率。这使我们能够评估近期信贷市场竞争变化对银行资本可能产生的间接影响。我们项目的第二部分涉及银行在对交易贷款和关系贷款之间的贷款分配进行压力测试后被迫增加资本的影响。自上次金融危机以来，压力测试已成为货币政策的一部分。在我们项目的这一部分中，我们的目标是了解压力测试对借款人之间贷款分配的可能影响。最后，在项目的最后一部分，我们研究了银行持有更高资本比率的激励因素。最近的实证研究表明，银行持有的资本比率远高于最低资本要求水平。我们项目的最后一部分通过分析更高的资本比率是否会给银行在存款市场上带来竞争优势来促进这一讨论。总体而言，我们的目标是阐明银行资本充足率的决定因素，以支持银行体系的弹性，并加强金融稳定。

During the last financial crisis, bank capital has been proven to be crucial for banks’ resilience, their performance and, most importantly, their loan supply during distress times. As a response to the crisis, policy makers have increased the minimum required capital ratios for all banks, and the increase was even larger for systemically important banks. Given the importance of bank capital and its positive impact on financial stability, it is essential to understand the determinants of banks’ capital ratios and the possible unintentional indirect effects of other regulation or policy responses on banks’ capital ratios. In this project, we aim to contribute to this discussion by studying the following questions: 1) What is the impact of an increase in credit market competition on banks’ capital ratios? 2) Does an increase in bank capital change banks’ loan portfolios? Do banks decrease their arm’s length loans and increase their relationship loans when they experience an increase in their capital?3) Does holding higher capital ratios give banks competitive advantage in their local deposit markets?In the first part of our project, our aim is to understand whether banks adjust their capital ratios when the credit market competition changes in the markets where these banks are active. This enables us to assess possible indirect effects of recent changes in credit market competition on banks’ capital. The second part of our project deals with the impact of banks’ being enforced to increase their capital after stress tests on their allocation of loans between transactional lending and relationship lending. Stress tests became part of monetary policy since the last financial crisis. In this part of our project, we aim to understand the possible effects of stress tests on the distribution of loans across borrowers. Finally, in the last part of our project, we study the incentives for banks to hold higher capital ratios. Recent empirical studies show that banks hold capital ratios well above the minimum required capital levels. The last part of our project contributes to this discussion by analyzing whether higher capital ratios give banks competitive advantage in their deposit markets. Overall, our aim is to shed light on the determinants of banks’ capital ratios to support the resilience of the banking system and to strengthen the financial stability.