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The aim of this research is to analyse the quality and the determinants of the social reports related to the Italian mutual banks (BCC) during 2010-2011. The qualitative aspects are captured by the compliance extent in accord with the standard measures GRI and ABI, while, the determinants detected are, together with other control variables, the bank size, the extent of the governance stakeholders structure and the employees' skill level. The empirical analysis has shown a poor quality of the social reports of BCC. Besides emphasising the ameliorative disclosure aspects, the strength point is to promote the awareness of appropriate disclosure as first step of transparency and fairness among relationships.

The paper examines both the direct regulatory cost and the compliance cost with financial regulations. More specifically, the paper intends to quantify the direct regulatory cost by considering, for the period 2000-2007 the accounting data of the regulatory agencies operating in Italy, France and Spain. This comparison can give a benchmark to asses the effect of regulation. Moreover the paper attempts to analyse the compliance cost with the financial regulation by using the data available in the surveys of Interbank Convention Automation for a period 2005-2007. An empirical analysis shows: a) a significant impact of direct cost sustained by financial authority much higher in Italy than in the other 2 countries, b) a significant effect of compliance cost on operating costs of the banks. The aggregated data of Interbank Convention on Automation leads to hypothesize, for smaller banks, the existence of cost disadvantage in comply with regulations.