Have donors changed their aid-allocation criteria over the past three decades toward greater selectivity, a frequently stated goal of the international development community? Using data on how 22 donors allocated their bilateral aid among 147 countries over 1970–2004, the article finds that...

Authors assess the dynamics behind the high net resource transfers by donors and creditors to Sub-Saharan African countries. Analyzing the determinants of overall net transfers for a panel of 37 recipient countries in 1978-98, Authors find that country policies mattered little. Donors especially...

A unique dataset of over 70,000 firms, most of which are small, in over 100 countries, is utilized to systematically study the use of different financing sources for new and young firms. Consistent age-related patterns emerge. Across all countries younger firms rely less on bank financing and...

Panel data for 91 countries are used to study how the ease of registering a business and the magnitude of registration reforms affect new registrations of limited liability companies (LLCs). The costs, days, and procedures required to start a business are found to be important predictors of new...

This article reviews the literature on the relationship between entrepreneurship and economic development and introduces four symposium articles. A common thread is that information asymmetries are important determinants of access to finance in young entrepreneurial firms. Policy recommendations...

A distinction is often made between short-term and long-term capital flows: the former are deemed unstable hot money and the latter are deemed stable cold money. Using time-series analysis of balance of payments data for five industrial and five developing countries, we find that in most cases...

This article investigates the behavior of stock returns in the twenty stock markets represented in the International Finance Corporation's Emerging Markets Data Base. The aim is to test for return anomalies and predictability. Using statistical methodologies that have identified seasonal and...

Equity flows to developing countries have increased sharply in recent years. Foreign equity investment can be beneficial to developing countries because of its risk-sharing characteristics and effects on resource mobilization and allocation. Empirical evidence shows that the stock markets of...

We assess the dynamics behind the high net resource transfers by donors and creditors to Sub-Saharan African countries. Analyzing the determinants of overall net transfers for a panel of 37 recipient countries in 1978--98, we find that country policies mattered little. Donors--especially...