Information Contagion and Bank Herding
证明，信息传染的可能性会促使追求利润最大化的银行所有者与其他银行产生羊群行为。当银行贷款收益存在共同系统性因素时，其他银行的不利消息会提高该银行的借款成本，从而激励银行进行关联投资以最小化信息传染对预期借款成本的影响。
We show that the likelihood of information contagion induces profit‐maximizing bank owners to herd with other banks. When bank loan returns have a common systematic factor, the cost of borrowing for a bank increases when there is adverse news on other banks since such news conveys adverse information about the common factor. The increase in a bank's cost of borrowing relative to the situation of good news about other banks is greater when bank loan returns have less commonality (in addition to the systematic risk factor). Hence, banks herd and undertake correlated investments so as to minimize the impact of such information contagion on the expected cost of borrowing. Competitive effects such as superior margins from lending in different industries mitigate herding incentives.