Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in Juan Sergio LopezFedercasse, Rome March 2015Abstract This paper uses data from a panel of more than 400 Italian banks for the period 2001 -2012 to examine the main determinants of loan loss provision (LLP), which are classified as either discretionary (income smoothing, capital management, signalling) or non-discretionary (related to the business cycle). The results suggest that LLP in Italian banks is driven mainly by non-discretionary components, especially during the recession of 2008-2012, and is consistent with a countercyclical behavior of LLP. Further, it is generally less pro-cyclical (although not during the recent economic crisis) in the case of local banks: since their loans are more collateralised, their behaviour is more strongly affected by supervisory activity, their initial coverage ratio being lower than for other banks. JEL classification: G21, G28

Studying banking networks designed to achieve scale economies for their members, we argue that “inner” competition – competition inside network members – may be inefficient vis-à-vis “outer” competition – competition with outsiders. Testing our hypothesis on branch-level loan productivity per employee at the Banche di Credito Cooperativo (BCCs), Italy’s network of mutual cooperative banks, we find that BCC monopoly always dominates BCC duopoly. Moreover, productivity is generally higher in situations of either BCC monopoly or BCC facing only outer competition vis-à-vis situations exhibiting (also) inner competition. The policy implication is that limits to inner rivalry seem efficiency improving in cooperative banking networks

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A panel of Italian banks for the period 2006-2012 is used in this paper to examine LLP main determinants. Our analysis also focuses on the determinants of the sub-components of LLP, i.e. provisions associated to Bad Loans and Impaired Loans and Bad Loans and Impaired Loans Coverage Ratio. A specific analysis for cooperative credit banks is provided. We find that Loan Loss provisioning for Italian banks seems to be driven principally by non-discretionary behavior. Economic fluctuations, according to our results, do not play a significant role, nor do signaling and income smoothing. Provisioning strategies for cooperative credit banks also seem to be affected by collateralized loans.

This paper analyses macroeconomic and financial determinants of bad loans applying a SVAR approach to investigate whether excessive loans granted during expansionary phases can explain the more than proportional increase in non-performing loans during contractionary periods. The results indicate that the effects of a permanent shock to bad loans on the excess of credit are significant and persistent for bad loans to firms, but not for bad loans to households or in the case of Cooperative Credit Banks, who adopt more efficient lending policies.