Contemporary Issues in Financial Institutions and Markets

Claudia Girardone is Professor in Banking and Finance at the Essex Business School, University of Essex, UK. Her research interests focus on modelling efficiency and productivity of financial institutions, bank mergers and acquisitions, bank corporate governance, competition issues and banking integration. She has published widely in international peer-reviewed journals and co-authored a textbook entitled Introduction to Banking (2006). She is on the editorial board of several journals including the Journal of Banking and Finance and the European Journal of Finance.John Wilson is Professor of Banking & Finance and Director for the Centre for Responsible Banking & Finance at the University of St Andrews, UK. His research focuses on the areas of Industrial Organization, Banking and Credit Unions. He is the author/co-author of books, a monograph, chapters and articles. His books include European Banking: Efficiency, Technology and Growth, Industrial Organisation: An Analysis of Competitive Markets, The Economics of Business Strategy, and Industrial Organization: Competition Strategy and Policy (now in its fourth edition with translations in Italian and Greek). John edited a Routledge Major Works, Banking. He also co-edited the Oxford Handbook of Banking (with Allen Berger and Phil Molyneux). Philip Hamill is Dean of The Institute of Banking, Ireland. His research involves theoretical and empirical analysis of financial markets with a specific focus on modelling stock market volatility, security valuation and corporate governance. During his academic career he has been seconded to work in the financial services sector and has been a consultant to both public and private sector organisations. His research has been published in a range of leading academic journals, books and professional periodicals including the Journal of Empirical Finance, Global Finance Journal, The Financial Review and the British Accounting Review.

• 1. Introduction Claudia Girardone, Philip Hamill, John O.S. Wilson 2. Are there benefits to being naked? The returns and diversification impact of capital structure arbitrage Giovanni Calice, Jing Chen and Julian M. Williams 3. The path to impairment: do credit-rating agencies anticipate default events of structured finance transactions? Matthias Bodenstedt, Daniel Rösch and Harald Scheule 4. The determinants of bank CDS spreads: evidence from the financial crisis Laura Chiaramonte and Barbara Casu 5. The impact of market power and funding strategy on bank-interest margins Mohammed Amidu and Simon Wolfe 6. An examination of investor sentiment effect on G7 stock market returns Deven Bathia and Don Bredin