The studies commented upon here are rich on an informative level, and combine well the three elements which characterise all the research of the Banca Commerciale Italiana presented in this volume: the theoretical element, the empirical one, and the institutional one. In doing so, they satisfy the fundamental objective which appears to me to pull together the research: they develop useful reflections at a policy level, both for an individual bank and for the authorities. I have no observations on the philosophy of these two studies; I will, however, briefly comment on each of the works.

The study by M. Maccarinelli, G. Marotta, and M. Prosdocimi in Chapter 12, proposes to gather comparable statistical data for the purpose of making significant comparisons between countries with very different institutional structures. It is an attempt which is to be appreciated since comparative analyses often neglect this problem and reach conclusions which are less than reliable.

There is a very broad range of data and indicators contained in the work. It is to be hoped that the authors will make further use of them in the future so as to get deeper into the implications of the differences between the various structures and how they may affect the competition between systems after 1992.

The ‘consolidated banking system’ proposed by the authors traces the system of the statistics already being used in Germany and France, and includes savings banks and investment banks in addition to the commercial banks.