Author's School

Olin Business School

Author's Department

Finance

Language

English (en)

Date of Award

Summer 8-15-2022

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Business Administration (DBA)

Chair and Committee

Taylor Begley

Committee Members

Taylor Begley, Asaf Manela, Anjan Thakor,

Abstract

I examine the effectiveness of off-site bank examinations by using the natural experiment during COVID-19. Exploiting the difference in the amount of soft information and in the effect of the change to off-site examination between the banks far from the supervisory field office and those near the field office, I find that distant banks increase asset risk regarding RWA to asset ratio and become less conservative in anticipating or preparing for future losses from loan portfolios. I also show that distant banks that adjust the loan portfolio to be riskier are less profitable, and the effect is prominent among the less-capitalized banks. My findings suggest that on-site examination plays a vital role in preventing banks from taking more risk in their asset portfolios.

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