PurposeThis paper sets out to corroborate the existing literature on investors' risk tolerance and to assess how the 2008 financial crisis has affected risk tolerance among Italian investors.Design/methodology/approachBased on a unique dataset of real-world portfolio choices made by 1,245 Italian investors over a period of 15 years (from 2003 to 2017), this paper presents two steps of analysis. In step 1, the whole period 2003–2017 is considered with the aim to integrate and corroborate the existing literature on the topic of risk tolerance, considering a complete economic and financial cycle. Step 2 took 2008 as the pivotal point between pre-crisis (2003–2008) and crisis (2009–2017) with the aim to observe the influence on risk appetite of the economic and financial effects of the crisis.FindingsThe results obtained confirm that men are more risk tolerant than women and older people are less risk-taking than their younger counterparts, although the relationship between age and risk tolerance is not necessarily linear. Moreover, our paper demonstrates that a crisis scenario has an influence on Italian investors' risk tolerance.Practical implicationsOur results are of interest to financial advisors, financial planners, asset managers, psychologists, behavioral researchers and more in general to providers of financial products and services.Originality/valueThe results presented in this paper are relevant and original because they are based on real investors who made real choices concerning their portfolio asset allocations.

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The wide-ranging academic literature on corporate governance in the banking sector includes only a few studies on bank ownership and, specifically, on the comparative power of shareholders within the corporate structure. This paper reports an investigation into the presence of multiple large shareholders and their influence on profitability and risk in the long-term, considering a sample of 697 U.S. and European listed commercial banks from 2008 to 2018. It was found that the number of large and institutional shareholders has a positive impact on profitability, but no effect on risk. However, long-term ownership by multiple large shareholders contributes to decreasing risk in banks.

PurposeThis paper aims to develop a conceptual framework on how the representativeness heuristic operates in the decision-making process. Specifically, the authors unbundle representativeness into its building blocks: search rule, stopping rule and decision rule. Furthermore, the focus is placed on how individual-level cognitive and behavioral factors, namely experience, intuition and overconfidence, affect the functioning of this heuristic.Design/methodology/approachFrom a theoretical standpoint, the authors build on dual-process theories and on the adaptive toolbox view from the “fast and frugal heuristics” perspective to develop an integrative conceptual framework that uncovers the mechanisms underlying the representativeness heuristic.FindingsThe authors’ conceptualization suggests that the search rule used in representativeness is based on analogical mapping from previous experience, the stopping rule is the representational stability of the analogs and the decision rule is the choice of the alternative upon which there is a convergence of representations and that exceeds the decision maker's aspiration level. In this framework, intuition may help the decision maker to cross-map potentially competing analogies, while overconfidence affects the search time and costs and alters both the stopping and the decision rule.Originality/valueThe authors develop a conceptual framework on representativeness, as one of the most common, though still poorly investigated, heuristics. The model offers a nuanced perspective that explores the cognitive and behavioral mechanisms that shape the use of representativeness in decision-making. The authors also discuss the theoretical implications of their model and outline future research avenues that may further contribute to enriching their understanding of decision-making processes.

During healthy economic/financial times, credit growth often happens without proper provisioning. This is due to a managerial myopia that underestimates the risks underlying an expansive lending policy, leading to lower profitability in following years. However, given the countercyclicality of credit standards, this effect shouldn’t occur during harsh times. In this paper, we analyse the relationship between abnormal credit growth and bank profitability during a crisis period. In particular, we test the hypothesis that during a crisis, abnormal credit growth improves bank profitability, given the need for higher, or at least stable, credit standards. We find support for this assumption using a sample of 101 large European banks observed during the recent crisis period. Results are robust to different robustness checks.