Zombie lending due to the fear of fire sales
研究发现，市场份额高的银行在房地产价格暴跌时，为避免抵押品价格进一步下跌，会向违约企业提供僵尸贷款，这反而拖累了健康企业的投资和盈利。
This paper provides evidence of a new cost of fire sales: zombie lending by banks. Banks with high market share are more likely to internalize the negative spillovers of falling collateral prices during a fire sale. To prevent prices from falling further during a fire sale, these banks do not liquidate defaulted firms and instead give zombie loans to keep them alive. Using structural breaks in real estate prices to identify periods of fire sales in different MSAs, we provide evidence that banks with high market share give zombie loans to firms with relatively higher real estate assets during a fire sale. Further, congestion due to zombie firms in an industry reduces the investment and profitability of healthier firms. Overall, we highlight a new mechanism for zombie lending resulting from reduced collateral liquidation in markets prone to fire sales.