Banks as Secret Keepers
Tri Vi Dang, Gary Gorton, Bengt Holmström, Guillermo Ordoñez
American Economic Review · 2017 · Volume 107 · Issue 4
Abstract
Banks produce short-term debt for transactions and storing value. The value of this debt must not vary over time so agents can easily trade it at par like money. To produce money-like safe liquidity, banks keep detailed information about their loans secret, reducing liquidity if needed to prevent agents from producing costly private information about the banks' loans. Capital markets involve information revelation, so they produce risky liquidity. The trade-off between less safe liquidity and more risky liquidity determines which firms choose to fund projects through banks and which ones through capital markets.
Keywords
Intertemporal Firm Choice, Investment, Capacity, and Financing, Money Supply, Credit, Money Multipliers, Banks, Depository Institutions, Micro Finance Institutions, Mortgages, Capital Budgeting, Fixed Investment and Inventory Studies, Financing Policy, Financial Risk and Risk Management, Capital and Ownership Structure, Value of Firms, Goodwill
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