University of Connecticut, 2008. 48 с.
The capital structure and regulation of financial intermediaries is
an important topic for practitioners, regulators and academic
researchers. In general, theory predicts that firms choose their
capital structures by balancing the benefits of debt (e.g. , tax
and agency benefits) against its costs (e.g. , bankruptcy costs).
However, when traditional corporate finance models have been
applied to insured financial institutions, the results have
generally predicted coer solutions (all equity or all debt) to
the capital structure problem. This paper studies the impact and
interaction of deposit insurance, capital requirements and tax
benefits on a banks choice of optimal capital structure. Using a
contingent claims model to value the firm and its associated
claims, we find that there exists an interior optimal capital ratio
in the presence of deposit insurance, taxes and a minimum fixed
capital standard.
Banks voluntarily choose to maintain capital in excess of the
minimum required in order to balance the risks of insolvency
(especially the loss of future tax benefits) against the benefits
of additional debt. Because we derive a closed- form solution, our
model provides useful insights on several current policy debates
including revisions to the regulatory framework for GSEs, tax
policy in general and the tax exemption for credit unions.