作者： bankr

Abstract
We investigate the effects of the negative interest rate policy (NIRP) in Japan on bank lending using regression discontinuity design (RDD). On January 29, 2016, the Bank of Japan announced the beginning of the NIRP from February 16, 2016. Since the financial market did not anticipate this policy, we use the event as a natural experiment. For a few months, starting from February 2016, a negative interest rate was levied on banks that held reserves exceeding the average monthly reserves of 2015. This allows us to employ RDD. The results suggest the average treatment effect on the banks to which a negative interest was levied was approximately -1.5% to -3.5%. In other words, the loan rates of banks to which negative interest rates were levied declined compared to those of the banks that were not subject to NIRP.

Abstract
How does a grayer society affect the political decision making regarding inflation rates? Is deflation preferred as society ages? In order to answer these questions, we compute the optimal inflation rates for the young and the old respectively and explore how they change with demographic factors, by using a New Keynesian model with overlapping generations. According to our simulation results, there indeed exists a tension between the young and the old on the optimal inflation rates. The optimal inflation rates are different between the young and the old. Also, they can be significantly different from zero, in particular, when heterogeneous impacts from inflation via nominal asset holdings are considered. The optimal inflation rates for the old can be largely negative, reflecting their positive nominal asset holdings as well as lower effective discount factor. Societal aging may exert downward pressure on inflation rates through a politico-economic mechanism.

Abstract
The Indonesian rupiah depreciated 50 percent between July 2011 and January 2019. Blanchard et al. (2015) showed that capital outflows from emerging markets can reduce output by increasing the cost of financial intermediation and can increase output by increasing net exports. Regression results indicate that Indonesian banks are exposed to depreciations, but that exports are not stimulated by depreciations. The findings also indicate that Indonesia’s export price index is positively correlated with commodity prices and negatively correlated with manufactured goods prices. Exporting more manufactured goods would reduce Indonesia’s exposure to volatile commodity prices and allow depreciations to stimulate exports. This paper considers several steps that Indonesia could take to increase its manufacturing exports.

Abstract
The extant theoretical literature on credit reallocation yields conflicting predictions on both the extent and the efficiency of reallocation during economic downturns. Using a comprehensive dataset of Japanese firms of all sizes spanning a period of more than 30 years, including the period of prolonged economic stagnation in the 1990s called “Japan’s Lost Decade,” we examine which predictions are consistent with the data to find the following: (1) the extent of credit reallocation is smaller in recessions than in expansions, which is attributable to the decreasing extent of credit creation; (2) this tendency was more pronounced during the Lost Decade, especially for small firms that experience a significant drop in the extent of both credit creation and destruction; and (3) credit reallocation generally is efficiency-enhancing, but it is less efficiency-enhancing in recessions and became efficiency-reducing during the Lost Decade, possibly due to financial assistance by banks to large but low-quality firms (e.g., through evergreening). These findings together suggest that the inefficient credit reallocation during the Lost Decade was characterized by efficiency-reducing reallocation for large firms and a low level of aggregate reallocation for small firms.

Abstract
This study examines how trade credit is utilized in global supply chains, using a unique dataset that includes information on firm-level supplier-customer relationships for major firms in the global economy. We focused on two potential factors of trade credit: firms’ upstreamness in global supply chains and competition among suppliers, or similarly, the bargaining power of customers. Although recent literature found a positive correlation between upstreamness and trade credit, we find the correlation is insignificant when we control for competition among suppliers and the bargaining power of customers. The correlation between firms’ upstreamness and trade credit is positive and significant only in Japan. In contrast, we find that the competition among suppliers and bargaining power of customers are positively and significantly correlated with trade credit in a robust manner. Because upstreamness and competition among suppliers are often positively correlated, our finding suggests the need to incorporate competition in the literature on trade credit and upstreamness.

Abstract
This paper investigates how expansionary monetary policy after the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) has affected the U.S. banking sector. In response to the GFC the Federal Reserve first lowered the overnight federal funds rate from 5.25% in August 2007 to zero in December 2008. It then turned to quantitative easing, purchasing housing agency debt, mortgage-backed securities, and longer-term Treasury bonds to stimulate the economy. While these policies helped the overall economy to recover, they may have harmed the banking sector. Banks accept safe short-term deposits and transform these into risky longer-term loans. They make a profit on the difference between the interest rate they earn on longer-term assets and the rate they pay of short-term deposits (the net interest margin). Low short-term interest rates and compressed spreads between long- and short-term interest rates may impair bank profitability. Bernanke and Gertler (1995) have shown that reduced bank profitability can hinder their ability to extend loans.

Bernanke (1993) noted that this is problematic because banks play a special role in channeling savings to promising borrowers. Financial markets are plagued by information imperfections. Savers release funds today for the promise of obtaining funds later. Whether they get repaid depends on the character of the borrower, the quality of the investment, the collateral that the borrower can provide, and other factors. The lender needs to consider these items and not just interest rates. Asymmetric information can thus hinder the flow of funds from savers to small businesses and other borrowers whose quality is hard to evaluate. Banks can bridge imperfect information problems because they have a comparative advantage because of: 1) economies of specialization, as lending officers gain expertise in a particular industry; 2) economies of scale, as it is cheaper for bank to evaluate a loan than for small savers to; and 3) economies of scope, as it is cheaper to provide lending services together with other services.

This paper investigates how lower short-term rates and falls in the spread between long-and short-term rates affect bank profitability. To do this it investigates how these variables affect bank stock prices. Stock prices provide valuable information since they are the expected present value of future cash flows. The results indicate that falls in short rates and in the spread have caused large drops in bank stock returns after the GFC. Banks are also facing competitive pressures from Fin Tech firms and big technology firms. Their performance after the GFC has lagged other parts of the U.S. economy. They are thus vulnerable to negative shocks that could arise during a downturn or a crisis. The Fed should take account of the impact of their policies on the banking sector, since an interruption on the flow of credit through the financial system could prevent funds from going to the most promising firms. This misallocation of resources could then hinder long-term economic growth.