Corporate governance in financial institutions has come under the spotlight since the banking crisis in the UK in 2008-9. In many respects, the banking business raises unique problems for corporate governance that are not found in other corporate secto

A heavily researched text especially for advanced students, scholars, and professionals in the field, highly recommended for the economics studies shelves of college libraries. Midwest Book Review While corporate governance in general has received considerable attention from economists in recent years, governance of banks specifically has received relatively little. Yet this is an important area both because banking is a large and important sector and because it is highly regulated so that the stakeholders and directors must share their governance authority with government regulators. This volume helps fill the gap. The 13 chapters, primarily by economists from a number of different countries, analyze governance in banking in both the US and other countries. Thus the reader can evaluate both the quality and effectiveness of bank governance across different economic environments. This makes the volume highly valuable to corporate investors and managers as well as researchers and government policymakers. George Kaufman, Loyola University, US Recent corporate scandals, together with the effects of globalization, have led to an increasing interest in corporate governance issues. Little attention has been paid, however, to international laws and recommendations dealing with corporate governance in banking from a global perspective. This impressive international set of expert contributors academics, practitioners and regulators remedies the lack of attention by examining the various issues and concerns of this important topic. The regulation of corporate banking and accounting is increasingly promoted through various international bodies. Against this background, the contributors explore such aspects of corporate governance as: bank regulation and activity expansion in the US, board structure, community banks, the Enron and WorldCom corporate governance failures, a survey of characteristics of the top 100 world banks, as well as case studies of Australian, German and Hungarian banks. Scholars, regulators, and those on the boards of financial institutions will find the analysis of this understudied area of great interest.

"Levine examines the corporate governance of banks. When banks efficiently mobilize and allocate funds, this lowers the cost of capital to firms, boosts capital formation, and stimulates productivity growth. So, weak governance of banks reverberates throughout the economy with negative ramifications for economic development. After reviewing the major governance concepts for corporations in general, the author discusses two special attributes of banks that make them special in practice: greater opaqueness than other industries and greater government regulation. These attributes weaken many traditional governance mechanisms. Next, he reviews emerging evidence on which government policies enhance the governance of banks and draws tentative policy lessons. In sum, existing work suggests that it is important to strengthen the ability and incentives of private investors to exert governance over banks rather than to rely excessively on government regulators. These conclusions, however, are particularly tentative because more research is needed on how legal, regulatory, and supervisory policies influence the governance of banks. This papera product of the Global Corporate Governance Forum, Corporate Governance Departmentis part of a larger effort in the department to improve the understanding of corporate governance reform in developing countries"-- World Bank web site.

This book explores the status quo of corporate governance in banking and investor protection from both theoretical and practical perspectives. Bringing together original conclusions with a regional and international focus, it provides a timely and comprehensive overview of the effectiveness of corporate governance in the financial sector and an assessment of investor protection. It also includes a number of examples and case studies to illustrate the findings. The book compares corporate governance in the banking and financial industries before and after the financial crisis, and helps to evaluate the effect of the recommendations and regulations that have been developed in the interim.

ÔThis book takes us back to the financial crisis and asks: should the directors of the financial institutions that caused the crisis be held responsible to their investors? LoughreyÕs and her contributorsÕ analysis of that question and the suggestions to implement their proposals are insightful and timely. This is a must-read book for those of us who are still trying to determine how to avoid the next financial crisis.Õ Ð Randall Thomas, Vanderbilt Law School, US The financial crisis revealed failings at board level at many financial institutions. But despite calls for bank boards to be held to account, there has been a remarkable paucity of litigation against bank directors for breach of their duties. This book assesses whether the law relating to directorsÕ duties and shareholder litigation has contributed to this, taking into account the changes to both that were introduced by the Companies Act 2006. With contributions from leading academics and practitioners, the book examines the directorÕs duty of care and skill, the s.172 duty, reporting obligations under s.417 of the Companies Act 2006, and shareholder litigation including the derivative action and just and equitable winding up. It concludes that neither the common law nor the statutory duties and derivative action under the Companies Act 2006 function effectively to hold directors to account and analyses why this is so. This detailed book will appeal to academics in company law and corporate governance as well as commercial law practitioners particularly those who specialize in company litigation.