Monetary Policy And Bank Risk Taking

We present evidence of a risk-taking channel of monetary policy for the U.S. banking system. We use confidential data on the internal ratings of U.S. banks on loans to businesses over the period 1997 to 2011 from the Federal Reserve’s survey of terms of business lending. We find that ex-ante risk taking by banks (as measured by the risk rating of the bank’s loan portfolio) is negatively associated with increases in short-term policy interest rates. This relationship is less pronounced for banks with relatively low capital or during periods when banks’ capital erodes, such as episodes of financial and economic distress. These results contribute to the ongoing debate on the role of monetary policy in financial stability and suggest that monetary policy has a bearing on the riskiness of banks and financial stability more generally.

This paper contributes to the current debate on what role financial stability considerations should play in monetary policy decision and how best to integrate macro-prudential and monetary policy frameworks. The paper broadly supports the view that monetary policy easing induces greater risk-taking by banks but also shows that the relationship between real interest rates and banking risk is more complex. Ultimately, it depends on how much skin in the game banks have. The central message of the paper is broadly complementary to those in the recent MCM board paper “Central Banking Lessons from the Crisis.”

We present evidence of a risk-taking channel of monetary policy for the U.S. banking system. We use confidential data on the internal ratings of U.S. banks on loans to businesses over the period 1997 to 2011 from the Federal Reserve’s survey of terms of business lending. We find that ex-ante risk taking by banks (as measured by the risk rating of the bank’s loan portfolio) is negatively associated with increases in short-term policy interest rates. This relationship is less pronounced for banks with relatively low capital or during periods when banks’ capital erodes, such as episodes of financial and economic distress. These results contribute to the ongoing debate on the role of monetary policy in financial stability and suggest that monetary policy has a bearing on the riskiness of banks and financial stability more generally.

We provide a theoretical foundation for the claim that prolonged periods of easy monetary conditions increase bank risk taking. The net effect of a monetary policy change on bank monitoring (an inverse measure of risk taking) depends on the balance of three forces: interest rate pass-through, risk shifting, and leverage. When banks can adjust their capital structures, a monetary easing leads to greater leverage and lower monitoring. However, if a bank's capital structure is fixed, the balance depends on the degree of bank capitalization: when facing a policy rate cut, well capitalized banks decrease monitoring, while highly levered banks increase it. Further, the balance of these effects depends on the structure and contestability of the banking industry, and is therefore likely to vary across countries and over time.

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Traditional theory suggests that more profitable banks should have lower risk-taking incentives. Then why did many profitable banks choose to invest in untested financial instruments before the crisis, realizing significant losses? We attempt to reconcile theory and evidence. In our setup, banks are endowed with a fixed core business. They take risk by levering up to engage in risky ‘side activities’(such as market-based investments) alongside the core business. A more profitable core business allows a bank to borrow more and take side risks on a larger scale, offsetting lower incentives to take risk of given size. Consequently, more profitable banks may have higher risk-taking incentives. The framework is consistent with cross-sectional patterns of bank risk-taking in the run up to the recent financial crisis.

The heavy losses in bank asset portfolios do not reflect an inherent failure of markets to monitor risk adequately but rather the perverse incentives of the financial safety net to excessive risk-taking. The unsustainable rise in house prices and their subsequent sharp decline derived from the combination of a public policy to expand home ownership to unrealistic levels and from a financial safety net that encouraged excessive risk-taking by banks. Charts and tables.