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Who Can Tell Which Banks Will Fail?

Author

Listed:
  • Kristian Blickle
  • Markus K. Brunnermeier
  • Stephan Luck

Abstract

We study the run on the German banking system in 1931 to understand whether depositors anticipate which banks will fail in a major financial crisis. We find that deposits decline by around 20% during the run. There is an equal outflow of retail and non-financial wholesale deposits from both failing and surviving banks. In contrast, we find that interbank deposits decline almost exclusively for failing banks. Our evidence suggests that banks are better informed about which fellow banks will fail. In turn, banks being informed allows the interbank market to continue providing liquidity even during times of severe financial distress.

Suggested Citation

  • Kristian Blickle & Markus K. Brunnermeier & Stephan Luck, 2022. "Who Can Tell Which Banks Will Fail?," NBER Working Papers 29753, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:29753
    Note: AP CF
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Marcella Lucchetta, 2025. "Crisis-Proofing Heterogeneous Banks," Working Papers 2025: 08, Department of Economics, University of Venice "Ca' Foscari".
    2. Acharya, Viral & Das, Abhiman & Kulkarni, Nirupama & Mishra, Prachi & Prabhala, Nagpurnanand, 2022. "Deposit and Credit Reallocation in a Banking Panic: The Role of State-Owned Banks," CEPR Discussion Papers 17621, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    3. Fascione, Luisa & Oosterhek, Koen & Scheubel, Beatrice & Stracca, Livio & Wildmann, Nadya, 2024. "Keep calm, but watch the outliers: deposit flows in recent crisis episodes and beyond," Occasional Paper Series 361, European Central Bank.
    4. Maximilian Grimm, 2024. "The Effect of Monetary Policy on Systemic Bank Funding Stability," ECONtribute Discussion Papers Series 341, University of Bonn and University of Cologne, Germany.
    5. Boyle, Glenn & Stover, Roger & Tiwana, Amrit & Zhylyevskyy, Oleksandr, 2022. "Depositor responses to a banking crisis: Are finance professionals special?," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 182-195.
    6. Marco Cipriani & Thomas M. Eisenbach & Anna Kovner, 2024. "Tracing Bank Runs in Real Time," Staff Reports 1104, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    7. Marcella Lucchetta, 2025. "Bank Heterogeneity and Crisis Migration: A General Equilibrium Analysis of Systemic Risk," Working Papers 2025: 05, Department of Economics, University of Venice "Ca' Foscari".
    8. Kristian S. Blickle & Cecilia Parlatore & Anthony Saunders, 2025. "Deposit Specialization and Lending Behavior," Staff Reports 1175, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    9. Sergio A. Correia & Stephan Luck & Emil Verner, 2024. "Failing Banks," NBER Working Papers 32907, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Gao, Haoyu & Li, Jinxuan & Wen, Huiyu, 2023. "Bank funding costs during the COVID-19 pandemic: Evidence from China," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • G20 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - General
    • G21 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Banks; Other Depository Institutions; Micro Finance Institutions; Mortgages

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