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What Do State-Owned Firms Maximize? Evidence from the Italian Banks

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  • Sapienza, Paola

Abstract

This Paper studies the objective function of state-owned banks. Using information on individual loan contracts, I compare the interest rate charged to two sets of companies with identical characteristics borrowing respectively from state-owned and privately owned banks. State-owned banks charge lower interest rates than do privately owned banks to similar or identical firms, even if the company is able to borrow more from privately owned banks. State-owned banks mostly favour firms located in depressed areas and large firms. The lending behaviour of state-owned banks is affected by the electoral results of the party affiliated with the bank: the stronger the political party in the area where the firm is borrowing, the lower the interest rates charged. This result is robust to including bank and firm fixed effects.

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  • Sapienza, Paola, 2002. "What Do State-Owned Firms Maximize? Evidence from the Italian Banks," CEPR Discussion Papers 3168, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:3168
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    Cited by:

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    2. Luigi Guiso & Paola Sapienza & Luigi Zingales, 2009. "Does Local Financial Development Matter?," Springer Books, in: Damiano Bruno Silipo (ed.), The Banks and the Italian Economy, chapter 0, pages 31-66, Springer.
    3. Mr. Michael Andrews, 2005. "State-Owned Banks, Stability, Privatization, and Growth: Practical Policy Decisions in a World Without Empirical Proof," IMF Working Papers 2005/010, International Monetary Fund.
    4. Kleff, Volker & Weber, Martin, 2005. "Payout Policy and Owners? Interests: Evidence from German Savings Banks," ZEW Discussion Papers 05-59, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    5. Alexandre Rands Barros, 2005. "The Impact Of State Owned Banks On Interest Rates Spread," Anais do XXXIII Encontro Nacional de Economia [Proceedings of the 33rd Brazilian Economics Meeting] 041, ANPEC - Associação Nacional dos Centros de Pós-Graduação em Economia [Brazilian Association of Graduate Programs in Economics].
    6. Gianpaolo Rossini, 2019. "State Owned Enterprises (SOEs) and Non Transparent Trade Policies," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 5(3), pages 433-453, October.
    7. Mariarosaria Agostino & Leone Leonida & Francesco Trivieri, 2005. "Profits persistence and ownership: evidence from the Italian banking sector," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(14), pages 1615-1621.
    8. Farabullini,F. & Hester,D.D., 2001. "The performance of some recently privatized Italian banks," Working papers 10, Wisconsin Madison - Social Systems.
    9. Saunders, Anthony & Acharya, Viral & Hasan, Iftekhar, 2002. "The Effects of Focus and Diversification on Bank Risk and Return: Evidence from Individual Bank Loan Portfolios," CEPR Discussion Papers 3252, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    10. Claeys, Sophie & Vander Vennet, Rudi, 2008. "Determinants of bank interest margins in Central and Eastern Europe: A comparison with the West," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 197-216, June.
    11. International Labour Office, 2014. "Portugal : tackling the jobs crisis in Portugal," Studies on Growth with Equity 485326, International Labour Office, Research Department.
    12. Cruz, Rita. & Kühn, Stefan. & Milasi, Santo. & Pignatti, Clemente. & Silvander, Johanna. & Spiezia, Vincenzo. & Torres, Raymond., 2014. "Portugal : tackling the jobs crisis in Portugal," Studies on Growth with Equity, International Labour Office, Research Department, number 994853263402676, October.
    13. Maria-Eleni K. Agoraki & Georgios P. Kouretas, 2019. "The determinants of net interest margin during transition," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 53(4), pages 1005-1029, November.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Government; Ownership;

    JEL classification:

    • G10 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • H11 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government - - - Structure and Scope of Government
    • L32 - Industrial Organization - - Nonprofit Organizations and Public Enterprise - - - Public Enterprises; Public-Private Enterprises

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