Second, the high levels of banks’ discretionary capital observed do not appear to be explained by buffers that banks hold to insure against falling below the minimum capital requirement. Banks that would face a lower cost of raising equity at short notice (profitable, dividend paying banks with high market to book ratios) tend to hold significantly more capital. Third, the consistency between non-financial firms and banks does not extend to the components of leverage (deposit and non-deposit liabilities). Over time, banks have financed their balance sheet growth entirely with non-deposit liabilities, which implies that the composition of banks’ total liabilities.
