Skip to main content
Log in

The efficiencies defense and commercial bank merger regulation

  • Published:
Review of Industrial Organization Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

A binomial probit model is used to estimate the Board of Governors' commercial bank merger policy during the pre-deregulation era from 1963 to 1980. The Board's merger policy is shown to be consistent with a ‘Williamsonian’ efficiencies policy. This contrasts with the merger antitrust environment of the time in which merger-induced efficiencies were not considered. The results also suggest that the Board was influenced by the empirical cost studies of the time.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Amel, D. and Keane, D. (1987) ‘State Laws Affecting Commercial Bank Branching, Multibank Holding Company Expansion, and Interstate Banking’, unpublished paper.

  • American Bar Association Section of Antitrust Law (1986), Monograph 12, Horizontal Mergers: Law and Policy.

  • Benston, G. J., Hanweck, G. A., and Humphrey, D. B. (1982, November) ‘Scale Economies in Banking: A Restructuring and Reassessment’, Journal of Money, Credit, and Banking, Part 1.

  • Clark, J. A. (1988, September) ‘Economies of Scale and Scope At Depository Institutions: A Review of the Literature’, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, Economic Review.

  • Federal Reserve Bulletin (1963–1980) United States Government Printing Office.

  • Gilbert, R. A. (1984, November) ‘Bank Market Structure and Competition’, Journal of Money, Credit, and Banking, Part 2.

  • Heggestad, A. and Shepherd, W. (1986) ‘The ‘Banking’ Industry’, in Adams, W. (ed.), The Structure of American Industry, 7th ed., MacMillan.

  • Humphrey, D. (1985) ‘Cost and Scale Economies in Bank Intermediaries’, in Aspinwall, R. and Eisenbeis, R. (eds.), Handbook for Banking Strategies, Wiley.

  • Hunter, W. C. and Timme, S. G. (1986, May) ‘Technical Change, Organizational Form, and the Structure of Bank Production’, Journal of Money, Credit, and Banking.

  • Judge, G., Hill, R., Griffiths, W., Lüthepohl, H. and Lee, T. (1988) Introduction to the Theory and Practice of Econometrics, 2nd ed., Wiley.

  • Kintner, E. W. (1973) Primer on the Law of Mergers, MacMillan.

  • Maddala, G. (1983) Limited-Dependent and Qualitative Variables in Econometrics, Cambridge University Press.

  • Salop, S. (1987, Fall) ‘Symposium on Mergers and Antitrust’, Journal of Economic Perspectives.

  • U.S. Department of Justice (1968) Merger Guidelines, May 30.

  • U.S. Department of Justice (1984) Merger Guidelines, May 30.

  • White, L. (1986) ‘The Partical Deregulation of Banks and other Depository Institutions’, in Weiss, L. and Klass, M. (eds.) Regulatory Reform, What Actuaily Happened, Boston: Little-Brown.

    Google Scholar 

  • Williamson, O. (1968, December) ‘Economies as an Antitrust Defense: The Welfare Tradeoffs’, American Economic Review.

  • Williamson, O. (1969, May) ‘Allocative Efficiency and the Limits of Antitrust’, American Economic Review.

  • Williamson, O. (1977) ‘Economies as an Antitrust Defense Revisited’, 125 University of Pennsylvania Law Review.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

DeYoung, R.E. The efficiencies defense and commercial bank merger regulation. Rev Ind Organ 6, 269–282 (1991). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00378126

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00378126

Keywords

Navigation