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The financial market crisis has brought the very business models of many banks into question. What lessons should banks take from these events? What consequences will the industry have to face when dealing with clients? These questions are at the center of this book, with contributions from renowned experts and examples from theory and practice. Client commitment – the pursuit of pure customer focus – has become a success factor in many areas of the banking industry. This book sheds light on the theoretical aspects of client commitment and shows how its various facets are being put into practice.

We investigate the effect of increased company involvement on consumer reactions to companies and nonprofits in business–nonprofit alliances to show that consumer reactions to the two parties in such alliances can, under certain conditions, diverge from each other. Specifically, we show that increased company involvement results in more positive consumer attitudes toward companies with low (but not high) reputation, while it leads to more positive consumer attitude toward nonprofits that partner with companies with high (but not low) reputation. Furthermore, we demonstrate that these effects are independent of the perceived fit between the company and nonprofit forming the alliance. Finally, we show that when consumers elaborate on company motives, the observed effects of increased company involvement are mitigated.

© Springer Science+Business Media New York 2013. With permission of Springer

Many companies today believe that corporate social responsibility (CSR) acts as a reservoir of goodwill, insulating the firm from the negative impacts of a crisis. Yet, the impact of CSR on public reaction to corporate crises is more complex. Drawing on research on stakeholder reactions to CSR and—more specifically—corporate crises, we present a contingent framework for understanding the roles of CSR in corporate crises and how to manage it. This framework posits that CSR plays four important roles: it (1) increases stakeholders’ attention to crises, (2) affects blame attributions, (3) raises expectations, and (4) changes stakeholders’ evaluations of crisis situations. Several factors underlying these roles are also discussed. Overall, this article underscores that while CSR may insulate companies and mitigate stakeholders’ negative responses in some cases, in others it may actually lead to the opposite effect, amplifying the negative impact of a crisis. The article ends with a brief discussion of the implications of our framework for effective crisis management strategies in the age of CSR.

With permission of Elsevier

We show that eurozone bank risks during 2007-2013 can be understood as “carry trade” behavior. Bank equity returns load positively on peripheral (Greece, Italy, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, or GIIPS) bond returns and negatively on German government bond returns, which generated “carry” until the deteriorating GIIPS bond returns adversely affected bank balance sheets. We find support for risk-shifting and regulatory arbitrage motives at banks in that carry trade behavior is stronger for large banks and banks with low capital ratios and high risk-weighted assets. We also find evidence for home bias and moral suasion in the subsample of GIIPS banks.

With permission of Elsevier