Le Pont de Londres: monetary policy spillovers, prudential policies and the financial centre effect

Robert Hills, Simon Lloyd, Rhiannon Sowerbutts, Dennis Reinhardt, Matthieu Bussière, Baptiste Meunier and Justine Pedrono

Large amounts of capital flow across borders. But these can be destabilising. So can recipient countries employ prudential policies to offset monetary policy changes in centre countries? And does it matter where sending banks are located? Our findings suggest it does. Our case study of French banks operating in London – part of a broader international initiative – suggests prudential policies have a much bigger offsetting effect on French banks’ lending out of the UK’s financial centre than on their lending out of headquarters in France. In line with those observations, we uncover evidence of a ‘London Bridge’ in cross-border lending: the way French banks channel funds to the UK is responsive to prudential policies in the rest of the world.

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Do emerging market prudential policies lessen the spillover effects of US monetary policy?

Andra Coman and Simon Lloyd

Prudential policies have grown in popularity as a tool for addressing financial stability risks since the 2007-09 global financial crisis. Yet their effects are still debated, with sanguine and more pessimistic viewpoints. In a recent Bank of England Staff Working Paper, we assess the extent to which emerging market (EM) prudential policies can partially insulate their domestic economies against the spillovers from US monetary policy. Using a database of prudential policies implemented by EMs since 2000, our estimates indicate that each additional prudential policy tightening can dampen the decline in total credit following a US monetary policy tightening by around 20%. This suggests that domestic prudential policies allow EMs to insulate themselves somewhat from global shocks.

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The growth of peer-to-peer lending platforms and prospects for banks’ disintermediation – hype or real threat?

Paolo Siciliani.

Peer-to-peer lending platforms (P2P platforms) emerged after the financial crisis by catering for pent-up demand for unsecured borrowing from individuals and small businesses. Ten years after the conception of P2P platforms, the question is whether they may soon start to penetrate more mainstream lending markets and thereby challenge high street lenders. For example, according to the latest survey compiled by Nesta, P2P lending for the year 2015 was the equivalent of 3.9% of new loans lent to SMEs, although the outstanding stock of P2P lending is much lower. This post considers how seriously in practice to take this threat to the traditional banking model.

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