1、2040 单词， 3420 汉字 出处： Source: Yener Altunbas, David Marqus Ibez,2004.” Mergers and acquisitions and bank performance in Europe”. European Central Bank: working paper series. NO. 398 / October.pp.4-34. Mergers and acquisitions and bank performance in Europe Non-technical summary During the 1990s a lar
2、ge process of financial consolidation has taken place in the European Union although cross-border mergers and acquisitions activity remains limited in the banking sector. Given the central role played by banks in the credit process and the economy in general, this process of financial consolidation
3、has attracted substantial attention not only from managers and shareholders but also from borrowers and policy-makers. While in the United States there is extensive empirical evidence on the effects of financial consolidation, the empirical literature remains limited in Europe. This paper aims to sh
4、ed some light on the consolidation process in the European Union banking sector. In terms of methodology, most of the studies analyzing the effect of bank consolidation on performance tend to follow two main kinds of empirical methods. On the one hand there are a number of studies comparing pre- and
5、 post-merger performance. On the other hand, another strand of the empirical literature uses a event-study type methodology, in which changes in the prices of specific financial market assets around the time of the announcement of the merger are analyzed. In this respect, the handful of cross-countr
6、y European studies conducted to date using an event-study methodology tend to find that banks merger and acquisitions accrue significant stock market valuation gains for both the target and bidder (see for instance Cybo-Ottone and Murgia, 2000). We use the former approach by comparing actual pre- an
7、d post- merger performance in acomprehensive sample of European Union banks from 1992 to 2001. The use of this methodallows us to cover a wider sample of European Union banks by including also banks which are not listed on the stock market. Building on earlier US work we also examine the impact of s
8、trategic similarities between bidders and targets on post-merger financial performance. The analogy with the US banking sector seems to be a useful one, as in this country an important process of banking consolidation and interstate expansion took place following a strong process of banking deregula
9、tion in the late 1980s and early 1990s. This can be compared to the on-going European process of financial integration, which accelerated with the single market for financial services in the early 1990s and, most recently, by the introduction of the euro. The consideration of the strategic dimension
10、 seems also to be relevant. Indeed, recent studies have provided an interesting contribution by sub-sampling the population of merging banks, according to product or market relatedness, to analyze whether certain shared characteristics among merging institutions could create or destroy shareholder v
11、alue or performance. By and large, the main conclusion of these studies is that while mergers among banks showing substantial elements of geographical or product relatedness create value, dissimilarities tend to destroy overall shareholder value. Unlike results from most of the US-based event studie
12、s literature, we found that there are improvements in performance in the European Union after the merger has taken place particularly in the case of cross-border M&As. By making the assumption that balance-sheet resource allocation is indicative of the strategic focus of banks, we also find that dom
13、estic and cross-border mergers are very different in terms of whether dissimilar or similar banks succeed in mergers. On average, we found that consistency on the efficiency and deposits strategies of merging partners are performance enhancing both for domestic and cross-border M&As. For domestic me
14、rgers we also found support on the negative effects of dissimilarities in earnings, loan and deposit strategies on performance. Yet, differences in the capitalisation and investment in technology and financial innovation of merging institutions were found to enhance performance. For cross-border M&A
15、s, diversity in their loan and credit risks strategies improved performance of the merging banks, while diversity in their capitalisation, technology and financial innovation strategies are negative from a performance perspective. This renders support to the often stated difficulties in integrating
16、institutions with widely different strategic orientation. These findings fit well with the process of financial consolidation observed in recent years in Europe. 1. Introduction and motivation Spearheaded by the creation of the single market for financial services and, more recently, by the introduc
17、tion of the euro, an unprecedented process of financial consolidation has taken place in the European Union. During the late 1990s, the volume and number of mergers and acquisitions (M&As) increased in parallel with the introduction of Monetary Union (Chart 1). According to most bankers and academic
18、s, however, the process of banking integration seems far from completed and is expected to continue reshaping the European financial landscape in the years to come. First, many of the forces underpinning this consolidation process such as the effect of technological change and financial globalisatio
19、n will continue to exist. Second, the number of banks per 1,000 inhabitants in the European Union is almost double the number in the United States, suggesting that there is room for consolidation in the European Union. Third, there is still a considerable degree of heterogeneity across European Unio
20、n countries in terms of the concentration of banks. As in other industries, this process of consolidation in the banking industry has attracted substantial attention from managers and shareholders. In addition, the pivotal role played by the banking sector in the economy has also ensured additional
21、interest from borrowers, depositors and policy-makers alike. One of the concerns for policy-makers is the possible impact of consolidation on the transmission mechanisms of monetary policy. The impact of bank consolidation on the transmission of monetary policy is a multidimensional issue. According
22、 to most empirical studies, an increase in banking concentration tends to drive loan rates up in many local markets thereby probably hampering, to some extend, the pass-through from market to bank lending rates. On the other hand, in terms of quantities, early concerns about loan supply restrictions to small and medium enterprises arising from bank concentration seem to have been exaggerated. In terms of methodology, the handful of European studies analysing the effect of bank consolidation on performance tends to follow two main kinds of empirical
