Maria Soledad Martinez Peria's blog

Much of the discussion surrounding the current European crisis focused initially on whether a default by Greece was inevitable and how that would impact bond holders. Over time, the attention has shifted to banks and the potential for a generalized run and failure of the financial system, not only in Greece but also in other countries. Unfortunately, the developments in Europe are awfully similar to those in emerging economies in the past. The lessons learned in emerging markets might have helped European policymakers lessen the spillovers from macroeconomic risk to the financial sector, and even at this stage may still be useful for understanding how to manage the on-going crisis.

Many emerging economies used to follow exchange rate pegs, had large degree of liability dollarization, and ran fiscal deficits financed by the banking sector, which led to “triplet crises” involving debt, currency, and banking collapses. The  crises in Argentina and Uruguay in 2000–02 are illustrative. In a recent paper co-authored with Levy Yeyati, we show that macroeconomic risks like exchange rate devaluations or sovereign debt defaults can quickly cause the collapse of banking systems. These macroeconomic events are not random or driven by contagion across banks. Macroeconomic factors that are largely irrelevant in explaining depositor behavior during tranquil times can rapidly become the main driver of market response during crisis episodes, even after controlling for standard bank-specific traits. Furthermore, a crisis in one country (Argentina) can contaminate the banking system of a neighboring country (Uruguay) in a matter of days.

The 2011 Overview Course of Financial Sector Issues took place earlier this month at the World Bank's headquarters in Washington, DC. This annual event is sponsored by the Office of the Chief Economist of Finance and Private Sector Development, and it provides an overview of issues of current importance for policy-makers, researchers, and practitioners working in the financial sector. Speakers included a number of well-known thinkers and researchers on financial sector issues such as Simon Johnson, Ross Levine, and Franklin Allen, and attracted some 70 external participants from central banks, ministries of finance, and bank regulatory agencies representing 45 countries.

The theme of the course this year was Financial Sector Practices and Policies after the 2007-2008 Crisis (view the full agenda). Lectures, case studies, and panel discussions covered a broad spectrum of issues surrounding this theme, such as long-run policy lessons from the financial crisis, the role of the government in the financial sector after the crisis, bank risk management models before and after the crisis, bank resolution mechanisms, building crisis management capabilities, the future of bank regulation, macro-prudential regulation and stress testing banking systems, capital markets and pension systems after the crisis, to mention the main ones. Also, the course looked into longer-term issues related to the development of the financial sector, e.g. remittances, financial inclusion, SME finance, and microfinance.

The 2007–08 financial crisis was one of historic dimensions—few would dispute that it was one of the broadest, deepest, and most complex crises since the Great Depression. Initially, however, the crisis seemed to be of rather limited scope, and many thought countries would be able to “decouple” from events in the United States. But after Lehman Brothers collapsed in September 2008, the crisis spread rapidly across institutions, markets, and borders. There were massive failures of financial institutions and a staggering collapse in asset values in developed and developing countries alike. Nonetheless, the reactions of stock markets varied widely around the globe, with some countries showing greater comovement with the US market than others (figure 1).

Together with Tatiana Didier, we empirically investigate the factors that determine comovement between stock market returns in the United States and those in 83 other countries in a recent paper. In particular, we evaluate the extent to which comovement with US stock market returns during this recent turbulent period was driven by real linkages, was driven by financial linkages, or was the consequence of “demonstration effects” (see Goldstein 1998 and Masson 1998), in which investors became aware of vulnerabilities present in the US context and reassessed the risks in other countries, reevaluating the value of their stockholdings.

Lack of competition in the banking sector has detrimental effects. Studies have found that it can result in higher prices for financial products and less access to finance, especially for smaller firms. Others have shown that it can lead to the entry of fewer new firms, less growth for younger firms, and delayed exit for older firms. Moreover, while a debate is still under way, new evidence suggests that lack of competition can undermine the stability of the banking sector, especially if some banks become too big to fail.

How to measure bank competition? In a recent paper Asli Demirgüç-Kunt and I propose a multipronged approach. While we apply this framework to Jordan, it can be used to analyze bank competition in any country. In fact, the approach developed in this paper has been used to analyze competition in China, the Middle East and North Africa, and Russia.

Remittances, funds received from migrants working abroad, to developing countries have grown dramatically in recent years from U.S. $3.3 billion in 1975 to close to U.S. $338 billion in 2008. They have become the second largest source of external finance for developing countries after foreign direct investment (FDI) and represent about twice the amount of official aid received (see Figure 1). Relative to private capital flows, remittances tend to be stable and increase during periods of economic downturns and natural disasters. Furthermore, while a surge in inflows, including aid flows, can erode a country’s competitiveness, remittances do not seem to have this adverse effect.

Figure 1: Inflows to developing countries (billions of USD), 1975-2008

As researchers and policymakers have come to notice the increasing volume and stable nature of remittances to developing countries, a growing number of studies have analyzed their development impact along various dimensions, including: poverty, inequality, growth, education, infant mortality, and entrepreneurship. However, surprisingly little attention has been paid to the question of whether remittances promote financial development across remittance-recipient countries. Yet, this issue is important because financial systems perform a number of key economic functions and their development has been shown to foster growth and reduce poverty. Furthermore, this question is relevant since some argue that banking remittance recipients will help multiply the development impact of remittance flows.

Remittances to developing countries reached U.S. $338 billion in 2008, more than twice the amount of official aid and over half of foreign direct investment flows.¹ Numerous studies have shown that remittances can have a positive and significant impact on many aspects of countries’ economic development. Hence, monitoring the market for remittance transactions has become critical for understanding the development process in many low-income countries.

Remittance transactions are known to be expensive. The Remittance Prices Worldwide database collected by the World Bank Payment Systems Group shows that, as of the first quarter of 2009, the cost of remittances averaged close to 10 percent of the amount sent.² At the same time, the data also reveal a wide dispersion in the price of remittances across corridors, ranging from 2.5 percent to 26 percent of the amount sent (see Figure 1 below the jump).

The process of financial globalization that accelerated in the 1990s has brought many changes to the financial sectors of developing countries.*  Countries have opened up their stock markets to foreign investors, allowed domestic firms to cross-list and issue debt overseas, and welcomed foreign direct investment into their local financial sectors.  When it comes to the banking sector, arguably no change has been as transformative as the increase in foreign bank participation in developing countries.  On average, across developing countries, the share of bank assets held by foreign banks has risen from 22 percent in 1996 to 39 in 2005.  At the same time, foreign bank claims on developing countries, which together with the loans extended by foreign bank branches and subsidiaries include cross-border loans, increased from 10 percent of GDP in 1996 to 26 percent in 2008 (see Figure 1).