O canal de balanço patrimonial da política monetária: uma análise regionalizada para a economia brasileira

Abstract

This work aims to inquiry the existence of the balance sheet channel in Brazils monetary policy transmission. Given the asymmetric information between lenders and credit borrowers, interest rates variations change the capacity of clients in borrowing through modification in banks stringency. The applied methodology seeks to control the influence of lenders characteristics on changes in the volume of credit from the selected branches. This allows for a better description of the relation among these variations and applicants representative financial status variables. Data from monopolistic branches belonging to large banks and the information over the relevant regional economic activity are used. The two-step strategy indicates a positive correlation between banks sensitivity to their clients financial position and the interest rate. According to the balance sheet channel theory, this is the expected outcome. The one-step strategy shows a positive and significant influence of applicants creditworthiness over the correspondent branchs volume of credit. However, evidences of the channel are only found in the model that includes a measure of borrowers average wealth and uses bimonthly data.