Randall S Kroszner: Community banks - the continuing importance of
relationship finance
Remarks by Mr Randall S Kroszner, Member of the Board of Governors of the US Federal Reserve
System, at the America's Community Bankers Government Affairs Conference, Washington, DC,
5 March 2007.
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I am delighted to be with you today to share some of my views on the vital role that community banks
play in the U.S. economy. I am particularly pleased to be part of this excellent America's Community
Bankers conference for a very personal reason: one of my first jobs was with a community bank. My
experiences at the teller's window provided a useful, in-the-trenches introduction to some of the issues
I now face as a Federal Reserve Governor.
Community banks play an important role in the United States economy, as they have throughout our
history. Indeed, the roots of commercial banking in the United States can be traced to the
development of community banks soon after the founding of the republic. The U.S. banking industry
has, of course, changed dramatically over the past 200 years with the emergence of large,
geographically diversified banking organizations that have the ability to exploit economies of scale and
scope and to compete in global markets. More recently, this evolutionary process has accelerated,
and the past two decades have witnessed dramatic changes in the structure of the banking industry
and the business environment in which banks operate. These changes have brought with them new
challenges for community bankers. Nonetheless, many community banks continue to thrive by
providing traditional relationship banking services to members of their communities. Their local
presence and personal interactions give community bankers an advantage in providing financial
services to those customers for whom, despite technological advances, information remains difficult
and costly to obtain.
These close ties, however, represent a two-edged sword, exposing community banks to risks even as
they provide a valuable and profitable market niche. For example, the close ties of community banks
to their customers bring not only potential benefits in screening and monitoring borrowers, but also the
potential for conflicts of interest. I would like to spend the next few minutes discussing both the
benefits of and the challenges facing community banking.
The special role of community banks: relationship finance
The earliest banks in the United States and elsewhere relied on close relationships with their
customers to obtain information about creditworthiness and to monitor loan performance. For example,
in an analysis of early nineteenth century banking in New England, Naomi Lamoreaux found that
many bank directors lent the bulk of the funds under their control to themselves, their relatives, friends,
and business partners. At the time, information systems were quite primitive, and it was difficult and
costly to obtain data about potential borrowers who were not family members or those with whom they
had a close relationship (Lamoreaux, 1994).
Relationship finance continues to be at the heart of community banking. I believe that the most
significant characteristics of community banks are: 1) their importance in small-business lending; 2)
their tendency to lend to individuals and businesses in their local areas; 3) their tendency to rely on
retail deposits for funding; and 4) their emphasis on personal service (Critchfield, et. al., 2004;
Petersen and Rajan, 1994). Hence, successful community banking today depends importantly on the
same characteristics that formed the foundations of the U.S. banking industry two centuries ago -
personal interactions among bankers, their customers, and their communities.
The conventional paradigm of relationship finance is based on the premise that small businesses and
households tend to be informationally opaque - an economist's term that may be even more opaque
than these small businesses and households. What I mean by this phrase is that "hard" systematic
data about the creditworthiness of such potential borrowers tend to be quite difficult to obtain. Thus,
the efficient supply of credit to these agents depends on "soft" information that may be generated
through close interactions with the borrower and knowledge of the community - that is, classic
relationship lending.
In contrast, larger banks tend to have a comparative advantage with larger, more mature firms for
whom quantitative, or "hard," information, such as longer, more-detailed credit histories, is relatively
easy to obtain (Petersen and Rajan, 1994). The distinction between community banks and large
banks, however, is clearly changing. Technology has lowered the cost of information processing and
facilitated the growth of information bureaus, making information about households and small
businesses more readily available. This information has allowed some institutions to substitute credit
scoring for more costly traditional techniques in the underwriting of some types of consumer and
small-business loans, particularly credit card loans. These products are quite different from traditional
unsecured personal or business loans, which rely heavily on information obtained from personal
interactions and relationships.
Indeed, there can be no doubt that community banks today face considerable challenges. Rapid
technological changes in the production of financial services, improved production and dissemination
of financial information about consumers and businesses, deregulation, the increasing geographic
scope of some banking activities, and the increased importance of nonbank providers of financial
services are some of the factors altering the financial marketplace. While many of these changes may
have increased financial system efficiency and lowered costs for consumers, they also present new
and sometimes difficult challenges for community banks.
These changes have coincided with a significant consolidation of the banking industry and a
pronounced decline in the number of community banks. If we define a community bank as any bank or
thrift organization that has total real assets of less than $1 billion, in 2002 dollars, the number of
community banks has declined about a third over the past decade. Most of this consolidation has been
due to mergers. A Federal Reserve Board staff study reports that between 1994 and 2003 there were
more than 3,500 bank and thrift mergers (Pilloff, 2004). In more than 90 percent of these mergers, the
target institution had less than $1 billion in total assets, and in about half of those cases the acquiring
organization also had assets of less than $1 billion. Acquiring organizations were typically larger than
their targets; about 50 percent of the transactions involved an acquirer that was at least ten times as
large as the target institution. Although merger activity has slowed since the 1990s, there were still at
least 200 mergers each year between 2000 and 2006.
Despite these changes, community banks continue to fill an important niche in banking, providing
relationship loans in specific business and economic sectors (most notably small-business and
agricultural lending), personalized service, and a local presence. Indeed, we have a considerable body
of evidence that points to the value and viability of these institutions. For example, despite the decline
in numbers that I just mentioned, there are still more than 7,000 community banking organizations,
accounting for about 95 percent of all banks and thrifts in the United States today. Furthermore, new
community banks continue to be formed. During the period 2000 through 2005, about 120 new
community banks were chartered, on average, each year. And during the first three quarters of 2006,
137 new community banks were chartered. These figures suggest that many people continue to
believe that community banks have an important niche to fill and, as a result, are willing to invest in the
future of community banking.
A variety of indicators suggest that as a whole, today's community banks are doing well. The average
return on equity (ROE) at community banks, for instance, is quite solid and has improved over the past
few years. Net interest margins for community banks are, on average, higher than those for larger
banks, and recently this difference has been widening. And, as a result of stable interest margins and
improved cost controls, the return on assets (ROA) for community banks as a whole has remained
well above industry standards for strong performance.
Looking at other performance measures, we see that loan quality and capital ratios remain strong at
community banks. On average, their nonperforming-loan-to-asset ratios have been low and
comparable to those of the largest banking organizations, and their capital ratios have remained high.
In addition, community banks continue to demonstrate a healthy ability to attract deposits, with core
deposits funding about 70 percent of assets as of year-end 2005.
Community banks and small businesses
The thesis that I have put forward - namely, that relationship finance is important in sustaining the role
that community banks play and in accounting for their strong performance - has a number of
implications for small businesses' use of community banks and the proximity of banks and their
customers. The Board's Survey of Small Business Finances gives us a window on the relationship
between community banks and small businesses and the evolution of the banks' role. The survey data
are also helpful in contrasting the characteristics of small businesses that use community banks with
those of small businesses that use larger depository institutions.
By way of background, the Board conducts the small-business survey every five years. Our most
recent data are for year-end 2003 and were obtained from interviews conducted during 2004 with
more than 4,200 small businesses, a representative sample drawn from more than 6.3 million small
enterprises in the United States. The data were made available to the public in June 2006, but to my
knowledge no one has yet used them to assess the role that community banks play in small-business
finance.
Not surprisingly, the vast majority of small businesses obtained some type of financial service from a
bank or thrift in both 1998 and 2003. Over that period, the share of small businesses obtaining
services from nondepository institutions increased substantially, from about 40 percent of firms in 1998
to about 54 percent in 2003. Nondepository sources typically supply loans and financial management
products, including such services as check clearing, provision of letters of credit, cash management,
and credit card processing. Although the fraction of small businesses obtaining these types of services
from nondepositories has increased, the proportion obtaining them from banks increased as well. Both
of these changes reflect the fact that between 1998 and 2003 small businesses substantially
increased their demand for these types of services.
Our survey data provide evidence that community banks continue to play an important role in
providing financial services to small businesses, even in an increasingly competitive marketplace.
Among the small businesses that reported using a bank or thrift, in both 1998 and 2003 about a third
used a community bank.
One of the traditional strengths of community banks - indeed, a practical requirement for successful
relationship lending - is local presence. Although our survey results suggest that community banks
increasingly face competition from both larger banks and nondepository institutions, they also illustrate
the importance of proximity for many small businesses. In 2003, the median distance between a small
business's headquarters and its bank or thrift was three miles, about the same as in 1998. For lending
relationships, the median distance was four miles. Clearly, proximity and convenience, two of the
characteristics that epitomize relationship finance at community banks, are important factors
underlying the choice of financial service providers by small businesses.
Comparisons of the characteristics of the community and larger banks used by small businesses
reveal differences that are consistent with the idea that community banks specialize in relationship
finance. On average, the distances between small businesses and the banks from which they
obtained financial services were smaller for community banks than for larger banks. Small businesses
were also more likely: 1) to have longer relationships; 2) to obtain a larger number of services; and 3)
to conduct business in person with community banks than with larger banks. And when asked why
they used a specific institution, business owners using community banks were substantially more likely
to mention the importance of relationships.
Our survey results also allow us to consider whether small businesses that use community banks have
different characteristics than those that use large banks. Of the firms that used banks in 2003, one-fifth
used community banks exclusively, two-thirds used large banks exclusively, and the remainder
(14 percent) used both.
As described above, relationship lending is most important to firms lacking hard information, and those
firms, in general, are expected to be the smaller firms. Consistent with this view, our survey indicates
that the average firm that used community banks exclusively was smaller in terms of number of
employees, sales, and assets than the average firm that used large institutions exclusively or that
used both community banks and large banks. In addition, firms that used only community banks used
fewer services overall than other types of firms - which is consistent with their smaller size - but at the
same time obtained slightly more services from each bank than did firms that used only larger banks.
This suggests that community-bank-only firms are more likely to cluster their purchases at a single
institution than are other firms, behavior that is consistent with the importance of relationship finance.
Overall, in my judgment, our survey data confirm the view that, despite changes in the competitive
environment, community banks continue to play an important role in providing relationship finance to
small businesses in their local banking markets.
Potential conflicts of interest
The very relationships that underlie relationship finance, and that constitute the primary source of
community bankers' comparative advantage in meeting the financial needs of small businesses and
households, also present challenges. As I mentioned earlier, relationship finance dates back to the
very earliest banking institutions in our country. Although the extreme form of relationship lending that
characterized early nineteenth century New England banking had the potential to undermine the
safety and soundness of these early banking institutions, Naomi Lamoreaux's research suggests that
market forces acted to minimize the adverse effects. In an environment characterized by easy entry
into banking, bank directors apparently had strong incentives to monitor lending and minimize risks
because their business success depended crucially on maintaining their unsullied reputations. Of
course, this salutary outcome was by no means inevitable, as evidenced by experiences in a number
of developing countries where this type of lending behavior has had quite pernicious effects; rather,
the outcome was the result of the particular circumstances and competitive environment prevailing in
New England at the time (Lamoreaux, 1994).
When it comes to more recent times, evidence on the extent to which conflicts of interest resulting
from close ties between banks and their potential borrowers may have adversely affected bank
performance is limited to studies of the largest banking organizations. One example is my own
research with Phil Strahan that looked at linkages between the boards of directors of banks and
nonfinancial firms. Such board linkages can be beneficial because they improve information flow
between the linked firms; however, they can also lead to conflicts of interest because the individual
who serves as the link has fiduciary responsibilities to both firms, and those firms' interests can
sometimes diverge.
In our research, Phil and I focus on board linkages between large U.S. banks and Fortune 500
nonfinancial firms. This focus is driven largely by data availability. I would be very interested in hearing
from you about the extent to which community bankers sit on the boards of nonfinancial firms and your
views on the benefits and costs that result from these linkages. Our research finds that board linkages
are quite prevalent among the largest banking organizations - more prevalent than among large
nonfinancial firms - but that these linkages tend to involve firms in which shareholder-creditor conflicts
of interest are least likely to arise. We also find that the connected firms are more likely to borrow from
their connected bank, and that when they do, the loan terms are similar to the terms on loans to
unconnected firms. Thus, contrary to the results of studies of some other countries, where it has been
found that connections were misused, our results suggest that the avoidance of conflicts of interest
explains both the allocation and behavior of bankers in the U.S. corporate governance system
(Kroszner and Strahan, 2001, 2002).
On balance, evidence from both community banks in early nineteenth century New England and larger
banks in more recent times suggests that, as a whole, U.S. banks have managed their relationships
well and have avoided engaging in systematic conflicts of interest. Nonetheless, the potential for
problems is there, and it is important that bankers remain vigilant and regularly review the corporate
governance mechanisms they have in place to deal appropriately with challenges that can arise with
relationship finance.
Conclusion
In sum, it is clear that community banks face many challenges today, as they have in the past.
Technological developments in information production and dissemination, changes in the
management strategies of larger banks and other institutions, deregulation, and changes in the
delivery of financial services have reduced some of the advantages that community banks could once
offer their customers. As a result, community banks have lost market share to larger banks and to
nondepository institutions. At the same time, a large portion of small businesses and households
continue to value and avail themselves of the relationship lending, personal service, and local
proximity that community banks offer their customers. Community banks today are generally healthy
and profitable, and new ones are being chartered every year.
Along with the benefits of relationship finance, however, come some risks, including the potential for
conflicts of interest. This particular risk appears to have been mitigated significantly in the United
States, although it is important for bankers to remain vigilant and to regularly review the corporate
governance mechanisms they have in place. I expect that community banks will continue to exploit
their traditional advantages and expertise, to be valuable members of their communities, and to adapt
to their changing environment in ways that allow them to remain strong and viable competitors.
References
Critchfield, Tim, Tyler Davis, Lee Davison, Heather Gratton, George Hanc, and Katherine Samolyk
(2004). "The Future of Banking in America - Community Banks: Their Recent Past, Current
Performance, and Future Prospects," Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation Banking Review, vol. 16,
no. 3, pp. 1-56.
Kroszner, Randall S., and Philip E. Strahan (2001). "Bankers on Boards: Monitoring, Conflicts of
Interest, and Lender Liability," Journal of Financial Economics, vol. 62, pp. 415-452.
Kroszner, Randall S., and Philip E. Strahan (2002). "Throwing Good Money after Bad? Board
Connections and Conflicts in Bank Lending," Working Paper 02-12, The Wharton School, University of
Pennsylvania.
Lamoreaux, Naomi (1994). Insider Lending: Banks, Personal Connections, and Economic
Development in Industrial New England, Cambridge University Press.
Petersen, Mitchell A., and Raghuram G. Rajan (1994). "The Benefits of Lending Relationships:
Evidence from Small Business Data," Journal of Finance, vol. 49, pp. 3-37.
Pilloff, Steven J. (2004). Bank Merger Activity in the United States, 1994-2003, Staff Study 176, Board
of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.