Low Interest Rates and Bank’s Profitability – Update May 2019

Low Interest Rates and Bank’s Profitability – Update May 2019

My last post on this important topic was in 2017.  Since then several new articles and research papers have been published. I have compiled them in this post.  Please see references.

In my posts I have shown how many trends in economics for the last thirty years can be explained by unintendend consequences of US Federal Researve monetary policy of lowering interest rates to boost economic growth.

• Rise of Shadow Banking – MMMF
• Rise of International capital flows in USA
• Growth of Consumer credit – Credit Cards and Housing Loans
• Decline in Net Interest Margins of the Banks
• Risk taking by banks to maintain and increase their profits
• Rise of Non interest income of Banks
• Rise of Non core business of banks
• Rise of Mergers/Acquisitions/Consolidation in Banking sector

Related to these are:

• Business Investments by Production side of economy
• Increase in Market concentration of Products
• Increase in Mergers and Acquisitions/consolidation among Product market businesses
• Decreasing monitory policy effectiveness
• Wrong economic growth forecasts
• Secular Stagnation Hypothesis
• Rise of Outsourcing and global value chains
• Free Trade agreements
• Increase in Ineqality of wealth and Income
• Increase in corporate profits and equities market
• Increase in corporate savings
• Increase in share buybacks, and dividends payouts

 

I have yet to see an effort by economists and policy makers to analyze these trends in an integrated manner.

To be prepared for any future crisis in economic/financial system, collective efforts have to be made to understand non linear sources of complexity and fragility.

My related posts:

Impact of Low Interest Rates on Bank’s Profitability

Non Interest Income of Banks: Diversification and Consolidation

Funding Strategies of Banks

Low Interest Rates and Risk taking channel of Monetary Policy

Shadow Banking

Economics of Broker-Dealer Banks

Evolution of Banks Complexity

Low Interest Rates and International Capital Flows

Low Interest Rates and Banks Profitability: Update – December 2016

Business Investments and Low Interest Rates

Low Interest Rates and Banks’ Profitability : Update July 2017

Low Interest Rates and Monetary Policy Effectiveness

 

and this one,

Increasing Market Concentration in USA: Update April 2019

Key Sources of Research:

Monetary policy and bank profitability in a low interest rate environment

Click to access ecb-wp2105.en.pdf

The “Reversal Interest Rate”: An Effective Lower Bound on Monetary Policy∗

Markus K. Brunnermeier and Yann Koby

This version: May 3, 2017

Click to access 16f_reversalrate.pdf

Click to access 26d_rir_bankofcanada.pdf

Interest Rate and Its Effect on Bank’s Profitability

Muhammad Faizan Malik1,2, Shehzad Khan1,2, Muhammad Ibrahim Khan1, Faisal Khan

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/318648785_Interest_Rate_and_Its_Effect_on_Bank’s_Profitability

Bank performance under negative interest rates

VOXEU

https://voxeu.org/article/bank-performance-under-negative-interest-rates

How low interest rates impact bank

BBVA

https://www.bbva.com/en/how-low-interest-rates-impact-bank-profitability/

Negative-nominal-interest-rates-and-banking

Money and Banking

https://www.moneyandbanking.com/commentary/2018/10/21/negative-nominal-interest-rates-and-banking

Monetary policy and bank equity values in a time of low interest rates

Miguel Ampudia, Skander Van den Heuvel

 

Click to access ecb.wp2199.en.pdf

 

Bank Profitability and Financial Stability

Prepared by TengTeng Xu, Kun Hu, and Udaibir S. Das1

IMF

January 2019

 

https://www.imf.org/~/media/Files/Publications/WP/2019/wp1905.ashx

The Unintended Consequences Of Central Bank Policies & Negative Interest Rates

Forbes

https://www.forbes.com/sites/simonconstable/2019/01/31/the-unintended-consequences-of-central-bank-policies-part-2-of-2/#5acd08176153

 

Financial stability implications of a prolonged period of low interest rates

Report submitted by a Working Group established by the Committee on the Global Financial System

The Group was co-chaired by Ulrich Bindseil (European Central Bank) and Steven B Kamin (Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System)

July 2018

 

Click to access cgfs61.pdf

 

Monetary policy and bank profitability in a low interest rate environment

Carlo Altavilla Miguel Boucinha José-Luis Peydró

Economic Policy, Volume 33, Issue 96, October 2018, Pages 531–586,

Published: 09 October 2018

 

https://academic.oup.com/economicpolicy/article/33/96/531/5124289

 

 

Determinants of bank profitability in emerging markets

by E. Kohlscheen, A. Murcia and J. Contreras

Monetary and Economic Department

January 2018

BIS

Click to access work686.pdf

 

 

 

The Risk-Taking Channel of Monetary Policy Transmission in the Euro Area

 

Matthias Neuenkirch, Matthias Nöckel

4/2018

 

Click to access cesifo1_wp6982.pdf

 

 

 

 

ADAPTING LENDING POLICIES WHEN NEGATIVE INTEREST RATES HIT BANKS’ PROFITS

Óscar Arce, Miguel García-Posada, Sergio Mayordomo and Steven Ongena

2018

Click to access dt1832e.pdf

 

 

Banks, Money and the Zero Lower Bound

Michael Kumhof

Xuan Wang

Click to access 2018-16.pdf

 

 

 

Banking in a Steady State of Low Growth and Interest Rates

by Qianying Chen, Mitsuru Katagiri, and Jay Surti

IMF

https://www.imf.org/~/media/Files/Publications/WP/2018/wp18192.ashx

 

 

 

Changes in Monetary Policy and Banks’ Net Interest Margins: A Comparison across Four Tightening Episodes

Jared Berry, Felicia Ionescu, Robert Kurtzman, and Rebecca Zarutskie

Federal Reserve

2019

https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/changes-in-monetary-policy-and-banks-net-interest-margins-a-comparison-20190419.htm

 

 

 

Monetary Policy and Bank Profitability, 1870 – 2015

47 Pages Posted: 8 Feb 2019

Kaspar Zimmermann

University of Bonn

Date Written: January 25, 2019

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3322331

 

 

The effect of falling interest rates and yield curve to banks’ interest margin and profitability: cross-country evidence from the EU banks in the aftermath of 2008 financial crisis

Giorgi Chagoshvili

MS Thesis

 

https://repository.ihu.edu.gr/xmlui/bitstream/handle/11544/29306/The%20effect%20of%20falling%20interest%20rates%20and%20yield%20curve%20to%20banks%20%20interest%20margin%20and%20profitability%20cross%20country%20evidence%20from%20the%20EU%20banks%20in%20the%20aftermath%20of%202008%20financial%20crisis.pdf?sequence=1

 

 

 

 

Bank Performance under Negative Interest Rates

 

by Jose A. Lopez, Andrew K. Rose, and Mark M. Spiegel

 

Click to access VOXNNIR.pdf

Determinants of bank’s interest margin in the aftermath of the crisis: the effect of interest rates and the yield curve slope

• Paula Cruz-García
• Juan Fernández de Guevara
• Joaquín Maudos

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00181-017-1360-0

 

 

 

 

Key Determinants of Net Interest Margin of Banks in the EU and the US

MS Thesis

Charles University

Bc. Petr Hanzlík

 

https://dspace.cuni.cz/bitstream/handle/20.500.11956/99546/120297262.pdf?sequence=1

 

Low Interest Rates and Banks’ Profitability : Update July 2017

Low Interest Rates and Banks’ Profitability : Update July 2017

 

Please see my previous posts.

Impact of Low Interest Rates on Bank’s Profitability

Low Interest Rates and Banks Profitability: Update – December 2016

 

Since December 2016, there are several new studies published which study low interest rates and Banks profitability.

 

 

Liberty State economics – a Blog of New York Federal Reserve has published a new column in June 2017.

Low Interest Rates and Bank Profits

 

 

Reduced Viability? Banks, Insurance Companies, and Low Interest Rates

CFA Institute

2016

CFA Institute Blog: Low Interest Rates and Banks

 

 

Changes in Profitability for Primary Dealers since the Financial Crisis

Benjamin Allen

Skidmore College

2017

Changes in Profitability for Primary Dealers since the Financial Crisis

 

 

Deloitte Consulting has published a new report in 2017 on Bank Models viability in environment of low interest rates.

Business model analysis European banking sector model in question

 

THE EFFECT OF NEGATIVE INTEREST RATES ON EUROPEAN BANKING

July 7, 2016

International banker

 

https://internationalbanker.com/banking/effect-negative-interest-rates-european-banking/

 

 

Low interest rates place a strain on the banks

bank of Finland

2016

https://www.bofbulletin.fi/en/2016/2/low-interest-rates-place-a-strain-on-the-banks/

 

 

The profitability of EU banks: Hard work or a lost cause?

KPMG

October 2016

 

https://assets.kpmg.com/content/dam/kpmg/xx/pdf/2016/10/the-profitability-of-eu-banks.pdf

 

 

The influence of monetary policy on bank profitability

Claudio Borio

2017

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/infi.12104/abstract

 

 

Can Low Interest Rates be Harmful: An Assessment of the Bank Risk-Taking Channel in Asia

2014

Asian Development Bank

 

https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/publication/31204/reiwp-123-can-low-interest-rates-harmful.pdf

 

 

Determinants of bank’s interest margin in the aftermath of the crisis: the effect of interest rates and the yield curve slope

Paula Cruz-García, Juan Fernández de Guevara and Joaquín Maudos

 

http://www.uv.es/inteco/jornadas/jornadas13/Cruz-Garcia,%20Fernandez%20and%20Maudos_XIII%20Inteco%20Workshop.pdf

 

 

Dutch Central Bank has published a new study in November of 2016 on Banks’ Profitability and risk taking in a prolonged environment of Low Interest Rates.

Bank profitability and risk taking in a prolonged environment of low interest rates: a study of interest rate risk in the banking book of Dutch banks

 

 

Net interest margin in a low interest rate environment: Evidence for Slovenia

Net interest margin in a low interest rate environment: Evidence for Slovenia

 

Global Financial Stability Report, April 2017: Getting the Policy Mix Right

IMF

2017

IMF Global Financial Stability Report April 2017

 

 

Negative Interest Rates: Forecasting Banks’ Profitability in a New Environment

Stefan Kerbl, Michael Sigmund

Bank of Finland

Negative Interest Rates: Forecasting Banks’ Profitability in a New Environment

 

 

Low Interest Rates and the Financial System

Remarks by Jerome H. Powell
Member Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
at the 77th Annual Meeting of the American Finance Association
Chicago, Illinois
January 7, 2017

Click to access powell20170107a.pdf

 

 

Bad zero: Financial Stability in a Low Interest Rate Environment

Elena Carletti  Giuseppe Ferrero

18 June 2017

Click to access paper%20Carletti_Ferrero_18June2017_tcm47-360758.pdf

Low Interest Rates and Risk taking channel of Monetary Policy

From Monetary Policy and Bank Risk Taking

Gianni De Nicolò, Giovanni Dell’Ariccia, Luc Laeven, and Fabian Valencia
July 27, 2010

Part of the blame for the current global financial crisis has fallen, justly or not, on monetary policy. The story goes more or less like this: persistently low real interest rates fueled a boom in asset prices and securitized credit and led financial institutions to take on increasing risk and leverage. Had central banks preempted this buildup of risk by raising interest rates earlier and more aggressively, the consequences of the burst would have been much less severe.1

This claim has become increasingly popular in both academia and the business press, partly because the crisis occurred in the wake of a prolonged period of exceptionally low interest rates and lax liquidity conditions. However, little empirical evidence has been presented to back it up. And theory has had surprisingly little to offer on the subject. Few macroeconomic models have explicitly considered the impact of policy rates on bank risk taking. And models of bank risk taking have yet to incorporate the effects of monetary policy.

From The risk-taking channel of monetary policy in the USA: Evidence from micro-level data

A recent line of research suggests that there is a significant link between a monetary policy of low interest rates over an extended period of time and higher risk-taking by banks. This link points to a different dimension of the monetary transmission mechanism, the so-called risk-taking channel of monetary policy transmission (Borio and Zhu, 2008)

From The risk-taking channel of monetary policy in the USA: Evidence from micro-level data

For many decades commercial banks in the USA operated under a very restrictive regulatory environment. The McFadden Act (1927) restricted commercial banks from intra- and inter-state expansion of their branch network without previous regulatory approval. Furthermore, the Glass- Steagall Act (1933) prohibited, among other things, commercial banks from offering investment services, such as corporate underwriting, securities brokerage, real estate sales or insurance. These Acts meant to increase competition, protect small banks and limit their risk-taking behavior. Eventually, both Acts were repealed by the end of the 1990s; this allowed commercial banks to freely expand their network across counties and states and to join their forces with other financial institutions. Whether the removal of these restrictions on US banking activity has led to a decrease or increase in banks’ risk-taking behavior is an open debate in economic research. Mishkin (1999), for example, argues that the separation of the banking and securities industries restricted the ability of the banks to diversify, and thus to reduce risk. Then again, the demise of the Glass-Steagall Act led to large financial institutions and the well-known moral hazard problem created by a too-big-to- fail policy. This policy seems to have encouraged increased risk taking on the part of large US banks (Boyd and Gertler, 1993).

From The risk-taking channel of monetary policy in the USA: Evidence from micro-level data

Regardless its (questionable) impact on banks’ risk-taking behavior, the fact is that financial deregulation significantly reduced the number of insured US commercial banks from over 14,000 in 1985 to approximately 6,500 in 2010. At the same time, banking industry assets increased significantly from $2.73 trillion in 1985 to $12.1 trillion in 2010. However, this increase was not evenly distributed across the US banking industry and the sector became far more concentrated than during most of its past. For example, the asset share of the largest size group (i.e. organizations with more than $1 billion in assets) rose dramatically from 71% in 1992 to 90% in 2010.

From The risk-taking channel of monetary policy in the USA: Evidence from micro-level data

In this paper, we do not investigate the underlying factors of this consolidation trend. Instead, our focus is primarily on identifying how the gradual restructuring of the US banking industry (in its various manifestations), along with the varying macroeconomic conditions, have influenced the linkage between interest rates and bank risk-taking over time. Hence, adding a temporal dimension to the analysis allows us to better understand the dynamics of the risk-taking channel of the US monetary policy transmission over the last two decades. Throughout this period, the federal funds rate (the primary tool used for implementing monetary policy) varied significantly in accordance with the country’s economic conditions. During the 2000s, the Fed adopted accommodative monetary policies. Following the bursting of the dotcom bubble in late 2000 and the subsequent recession in the US economy, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) began to lower the target for the overnight federal funds rate. Rates fell from 6.5% in late 2000 to 1.75% in December 2001 and to 1% in June 2003. The target rate was left at about 1% for a year. At that time, the historically low federal funds rate resulted in a negative real federal funds rate from November 2002 to August 2005. Remarkably, since the first quarter of 2009 the level of federal funds rate has remained at its all-time low (0.25%). This exceptionally low level is likely to hold for an extended period of time as evidenced by the minutes of the FOMC’s meeting April 27, 2011.

From The risk-taking channel of monetary policy in the USA: Evidence from micro-level data

 

In forming its central-bank policy rates, the Fed, like other central banks, has the mandate of promoting price stability. However, unlike other banks, the Fed is additionally charged with promoting maximum employment. This dual mandate may well explain the Fed’s recent decision to embark on quantitative easing schemes in an attempt to keep interest rates at low levels in order to promote employment. Although these monetary policy decisions may potentially impair the performance of the banking sector, or change the structure of its risk-taking activities, the Fed avoids taking actions against financial volatility per se, or against banks taking losses or failing. Such actions are believed to raise moral hazard problems, which could ultimately increase, rather than reduce, the risks to the financial system (Plosser, 2007). Thus, the current (and expected) accommodative monetary policy implies that the Fed is more concerned with liquidity injections that facilitate the orderly functioning of the financial markets, rather than protecting banks from the consequences of their financial choices.

Key Research/Analysis Sources:

A) Monetary policy, interest rates and risk-taking

Mikael apel and Carl andreas Claussen; 2012

 

Click to access rap_pov_artikel_4_120607_eng.pdf

 

B) Monetary Policy and Bank Risk-Taking: Evidence from the Corporate Loan Market

Teodora Paligorova∗ Bank of Canada

Jo ̃ao A. C. Santos∗

November 22, 2012

 

http://www.frbsf.org/economic-research/events/2013/january/federal-reserve-day-ahead-financial-markets institutions/files/Session_3_Paper_2_Paligorova_Santos_risk_taking.pdf

 

C) Monetary policy and the risk-taking channel 

Leonardo Gambacorta
Bank for International Settlements (BIS)

BIS Quarterly Review December 2009

Click to access r_qt0912f.pdf

 

D) Capital Flows and the Risk-Taking Channel of Monetary Policy

Valentina Bruno Hyun Song Shin

December 19, 2012

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.269.6716&rep=rep1&type=pdf

 

 

E) Bank Risk-Taking, Securitization, Supervision, and Low Interest Rates: Evidence from Lending Standards

Angela Maddaloni and José-Luis Peydró

September 2009

Click to access Shangai_Jan2010.pdf

 

F) Capital regulation, Risk-Taking and Monetary Policy: A Missing Link in the Transmission Mechanism ?

24-25 September 2009

Claudio Borio

Haibin Zhu

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.184.5606&rep=rep1&type=pdf

 

G) Monetary Policy and Bank Risk Taking

Prepared by Gianni De Nicolò, Giovanni Dell’Ariccia, Luc Laeven, and Fabian Valencia* Authorized for Distribution by Olivier Blanchard
July 27, 2010

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.172.813&rep=rep1&type=pdf

 

H) Conducting Monetary Policy at Very Low Short-Term Interest Rates

By BEN S. BERNANKE AND VINCENT R. REINHART

MAy 2004

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.480.5070&rep=rep1&type=pdf

 

I) Does Monetary Policy Affect Bank Risk?

Yener Altunbasa, Leonardo Gambacortab, and David Marques-Ibanezc

March 2014

Click to access 05anares.pdf

 

J) Interest rates and bank risk-taking

Manthos D Delis and Georgios Kouretas

January 2010

Click to access Interest_rates_and_bank_risk-taking.pdf

 

K) Monetary Policy, Leverage, and Bank Risk-Taking

Giovanni Dell’Ariccia Luc Laeven Robert Marquez

December 2010

Click to access wp10276.pdf

 

L) The risk-taking channel of monetary policy in the USA: Evidence from micro-level data

Manthos D Delis and Iftekhar Hasan and Nikolaos Mylonidis

October 2011

Click to access MPRA_paper_34084.pdf

 

 

M) Bank Leverage and Monetary Policy’s Risk-Taking Channel: Evidence from the United States

Giovanni Dell’Ariccia Luc Laeven Gustavo Suarez

2016

https://www.ecb.europa.eu/pub/pdf/scpwps/ecbwp1903.en.pdf?17ecd6a759787404e7fa0ede3a8ec8c3

 

 

N) Money, Liquidity, and Monetary Policy

Tobias Adrian Hyun Song Shin

January 2009

 

Click to access sr360.pdf

 

O) In search for yield?
Survey-based evidence on bank risk taking

Claudia M. Buch

Sandra Eickmeier

Esteban Prieto

2011

 

 https://www.bundesbank.de/Redaktion/EN/Downloads/Publications/Discussion_Paper_1/2011/2011_05_13_dkp_10.pdf?__blob=publicationFile

 

P) DOES MONETARY POLICY AFFECT BANK RISK-TAKING?

by Yener Altunbas, Leonardo Gambacorta and David Marqués-Ibáñez

2010

 

 

Q) Monetary policy and the risk-Taking channel: Insights from the lending behaviour of banks

Teodora Paligorova and Jesus A. Sierra Jimenez

2012