The purpose of this article is to analyze how sovereign risk influences the use of trade credit, both directly and through monetary policy. In addition, we test whether these effects differ during the crisis as compared to before the crisis. Using a sample of 45,864 Eurozone firms (2005-2012), we find that trade credit received increases when sovereign risk becomes higher, but only before the crisis. However, during the crisis, trade credit supply decreases as sovereign risk increases. Additionally, monetary restrictions only lead to an increase in trade credit in low or moderate sovereign risk countries.

The financial crisis seriously damaged the reputation of the banking sector, as well as its profitability and risk of insolvency, which led many banks to adopt a sustainable approach aimed at balancing long-term goals with short-term performance pressures. This article analyses how sustainable banking practices affect the profitability and the insolvency risk of banks. Moreover, we examine how sustainable strategies determine the effects of market power and efficiency on bank profitability. We used a two-step System-GMM to analyze an unbalanced panel of 1236 banks from 48 countries over the period 2015–2019. We found that sustainable banking practices increased profitability, and market power was an important determinant of profitability among conventional banks, but not among sustainable banks. Higher levels of cost scale efficiency led to greater profitability for both sustainable and conventional banks. However, there was no significant relationship between sustainable banking and insolvency risk. These results indicate that the traditional determinants of bank profitability are not relevant in explaining the superior profits of sustainable banks, which suggests the emergence of a new paradigm related to sustainability among the drivers of bank profitability.

The purpose of this article is to quantify how bank capital determines the effects of monetary policy on bank lending. Additionally, we test how these effects differ during monetary contractions and expansions. Using a sample of 3,028 European banks between 1999 and 2012, we find that the reduction in loans caused by monetary restrictions is similar across banks regardless of their capital. In addition, during monetary expansions, banks increase their loan supply more as they become better capitalized. Contrary to previous studies, there are differences in the monetary policy transmission through capital only during expansionary monetary regimes. These results are relevant because previous studies have not measured how the marginal effect of monetary policy on the growth of loans varies with the value of capital. We contribute to the existing literature by using a new approach that quantifies this marginal effect, which considerably improves the interpretation of statistical results from models that include continuous variable interactions and allows a better understanding of the role of bank capital in the transmission of monetary shocks.

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The objective of this article is to analyse how the Single Supervision Mechanism (SSM), the first pillar of the European Banking Union, affects contagion between bank and sovereign risk in the eurozone. Additionally, we test whether this contagion is transmitted from banks to sovereigns or vice versa, and how this transmission differs before and after the SSM. On the one hand, using quarterly data from 80 banks and 13 eurozone countries over the period 2009-2016 (2,441 observations), we do not find solid evidence that the SSM reduces contagion from sovereign risk to banks' stock returns. On the other hand, the analysis of credit default swap (CDS) spreads comprises quarterly data from 25 banks and 10 eurozone countries between 2009 and 2016 (771 observations). We find that the announcement of the SSM in March 2013 reduces contagion between bank and sovereign CDS spreads. Additionally, before the announcement of the SSM, an increase in sovereign risk does not alter contagion. However, after this announcement, an increase in sovereign risk leads to lower contagion. Therefore, the announcement of the SSM has an immediate effect on CDS spreads, while there is not enough evidence for banks' stock returns.