Ulrich Schüwer

How do insured deposits affect bank risk? Evidence from the 2008 emergency economic stabilization act

This paper tests whether an increase in insured deposits causes banks to become more risky. We use variation introduced by the U.S. Emergency Economic Stabilization Act in October 2008, which increased the deposit insurance coverage from

How Do Banks React to Catastrophic Events? Evidence from Hurricane Katrina

100,000 to

Add-On Pricing in Retail Financial Markets and the Fallacies of Consumer Education

250,000 per depositor and bank. For some banks, the amount of insured deposits increased significantly; for others, it was a minor change. Our analysis shows that the more affected banks increase their investments in risky commercial real estate loans and become more risky relative to unaffected banks following the change. This effect is most distinct for affected banks that are low capitalized.

How Do Banks React to Increased Asset Risks? Evidence from Hurricane Katrina

This paper explores how banks adjust their risk-based capital ratios and asset allocations following an exogenous shock to their asset quality caused by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. We find that independent banks based in the disaster areas increase their risk-based capital ratios after the hurricane, while those part of a bank holding company do not. The effect on independent banks mainly comes from the subgroup of high-capitalized banks. These banks increase their holdings in government securities and reduce loans to non-financial firms. Hence, banks that become more stable achieve this at the cost of reduced lending.

Natural disaster and bank stability: Evidence from the U.S. financial system

We analyze the consequences of consumer education on prices and welfare in retail financial markets when some consumers are naive about shrouded add-on prices and banks try to exploit this. Allowing for different information and pricing strategies we show that education is unlikely to push banks to full price disclosure, which would be efficient, but instead to a new equilibrium in which banks discriminate between consumer types. Welfare analysis reveals that education, while positive for consumers who learn to make better financial decisions, imposes a negative externality on other consumers when banks respond by setting higher prices. Overall, the welfare effects of consumer education can be negative. Our results identify important pitfalls policy makers should take into account when considering the seemingly harmless intervention of consumer education.

The Effect of Natural Disasters on Bank Failures

The instability of banks during the recent financial crisis underlines the importance of understanding how banks determine their capital ratios. This paper conducts the first empirical assessment on how banks adjust their capital ratios following an exogenous shock to their asset risks. The existing literature, which uses non-experimental identification, faces the difficulty that banks typically determine capital ratios and asset risks simultaneously. Using Hurricane Katrina as a natural experiment, we find that banks in the disaster areas increase their risk-based capital ratios after the hurricane. This finding shows that banks act precautious by themselves irrespective of regulatory requirements. However, when we examine low-capitalized and high-capitalized banks separately, we find that results are driven by high-capitalized banks. In addition, high-capitalized banks increase their risk-based capital ratios by decreasing loans and not by increasing capital.

Add-On Pricing, Naive Consumers, and the Hidden Welfare Costs of Education

We document that natural disasters significantly weaken the stability of banks with business activities in affected regions. This is reflected, among others, in higher probabilities of default and foreclosure ratios. The effects are economically relevant and suggest that insurance payments and public aid programs do not sufficiently protect bank borrowers against financial difficulties. We also find that the adverse effects dissolve after some years if no further disasters occur in the meantime.

Savings banks and cooperative banks in Europe

We tests whether natural disasters have an effect on failure probabilities of banks in affected regions. Using data on property damages from hurricanes, earthquakes and other natural disasters in the U.S. from 1976 to 2010, we show that natural disasters significantly increase the failure probabilities of banks. This effect prevails when controlling for bank characteristics that are typically associated with bank failures. Surprisingly, our results suggest that banks are not more likely to fail due to disaster damage in the short-term period after a natural disaster occurs, but in the medium-term period.