Consolidation and Crisis in the US Banking Sector 1980-2022

Consolidation and Crisis in the US Banking Sector 1980-2022
Mouré, Christopher. (2024). Working Papers on Capital as Power. No. 2024/03. August. pp. 1-23. (Article - Working Paper; English).

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https://capitalaspower.com/2024/08/moure-consolidation-and-crisis-in-the-us-banking-sector-1980-2022/, https://www.econstor.eu/handle/10419/301397/

Abstract or Brief Description

Much of the economic analysis of banking crises focuses on the interplay between concentration and stability. A common theory is that concentration is associated with greater stability, whereas competition is associated with instability. In this view, there is a trade-off between, on the one hand, the higher prices and higher profits associated with a banking cartel, and on the other, frequent banking crises and lower prices caused by a fragmented sector. However, this theory is not entirely convincing. Principally, it tends to treat competition and concentration as independent variables, whereas in reality, causality works both ways: banks actively work to transform the structure of the system and transcend apparent constraints – whether through coordinating interest rates, influencing policy, or by transforming the business landscape through corporate amalgamation. In addition, the last two major banking crises in the US occurred in dramatically different conditions of concentration from one other, complicating any obvious empirical connection between concentration and stability.

In this paper, I try to move beyond this hypothesis by investigating the relationship between corporate concentration and banking stability through the lens of organized power. Using a combination of quantitative and qualitative analyses, I make two claims. First, since the 1980s, the differential profitability of large banks has been driven by corporate amalgamation. Second, crises tend to be followed by an increase in the pace of amalgamation. As a result, since the 1980s, banking crises have preceded a dramatic redistribution of resources and control to a handful of large banks. While it is not clear that concentration makes a banking crisis less likely, the evidence suggests that crisis makes concentration more likely. Though the research presented here is only tentative and exploratory, it indicates that since the 1980s, large banks have remade the business and regulatory landscape in ways that defy the logic of a simple binary relationship between concentration and stability, and that this needs to be taken into account when analysing the dynamics of banking crises.

Language

English

Publication Type

Article - Working Paper

Keywords

banks capital as power concentration crisis mergers & acquisitions United States

Subject

BN Money & Finance
BN Power
BN Policy
BN Region - North America
BN State & Government
BN Value & Price
BN Business Enterprise
BN Capital & Accumulation
BN Comparative
BN Conflict & Violence
BN Crisis
BN Distribution
BN Industrial Organization

Depositing User

Jonathan Nitzan

Date Deposited

20 Aug 2024 00:58

Last Modified

22 Aug 2024 00:15

URL:

https://bnarchives.net/id/eprint/834

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