Moreover, the mark-to-market completed by mark to model of a wide range of assets and liabilities has also contributed to this widespread focus on immediate financial performances. This focus on short-term performance can translate into additional volatility in the price discovery process: indeed, the shorter the investment horizon of market participants, the larger the impact on prices of any new information. Mimetic behaviour is by no means a new phenomenon on financial markets. However, technological developments on markets may have gradually reinforced this type of behaviour. The spread of benchmarking, which allows fund managers and clients to measure performance against that of other funds, together with the growing competition within the sector, appears to have favoured such “herd behaviour”. Some operators have come to the conclusion that it is better to be wrong along with everybody else, rather than take the risk of being right alone. A striking example of rational mimetic behaviour is the influence that hedge funds enjoyed, a few years ago, as "opinion leaders" and trend makers. The second set of factors relates to new market techniques or financial engineering devices. Here are a few examples of some of these mechanisms: •  The inclusion of contingent or trigger clauses in loan and bond contracts. These clauses provide creditors with a form of insurance since the level of interest rate paid by debtors increases when specific trigger events occurs (typically the downgrading of the debtor by rating agencies). These clauses were designed to help borrowers access financing at lower rates.
Dimitar Radev: The Bulgarian banking sector and the challenges in 2020 Publication by Mr Dimitar Radev, Governor of the Bulgarian National Bank, in the Quarterly Bulletin of the Association of Banks in Bulgaria, issue 60, January 2020. * * * The banking sector in Bulgaria ended 2019 with very good overall indicators and positive trends – high capital adequacy and liquidity, credit activity, improving asset quality and the historically highest annual profit of the sector. The asset quality review and the stress test conducted by the European Central Bank confirmed the resilience of the sector overall. The banking sector in Bulgaria will be strategically impacted by the developments in the process of accession to ERM II and the Banking Union, part of which was the assessment of six Bulgarian banks undertaken by the ECB. The final stage of this process is to unfold in the coming months. The fulfillment of the commitments assumed by Bulgaria, including strengthening the capital of two Bulgarian banks, will be followed by relevant external assessment. Following the set path, Bulgaria is drawing near to achieving a fundamentally new level of EU integration – membership in euro area institutions. This will bring about significant change in terms of banking supervision and bank resolution activities. The very onset of the process of establishing close cooperation of the Bulgarian National Bank with the ECB has already expanded the scope and enhanced the intensity of the two institutions’ joint work.