The impact of state guarantees on banks’ debt issuing costs, lending and funding policy

The empirical study carried out by London Economics on behalf of the European Commission analysed the market value of state guarantees given to banks in 2008-10 on banks' issuing costs and whether there were significant differences visible in the balance sheets of banks that used state guarantees and those that refrained from using them.

The report presents a comprehensive ex-post evaluation of one of the main tools to restore the functioning of wholesale financial markets after the Lehman bankruptcy. The results of the empirical research suggested that the guarantee schemes were successful in lowering the costs of bond issuance of participating banks while having relatively little distortionary impacts on non-participating banks. Moreover, cross-border spill-over appear to be non-existent.

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