During the past two years, private equity funds have acquired substantial portfolios of nonperformingloans from banks in Germany. Typically a private equity investor does notcommit funds unless exit strategies are clearly defined. The usual exit strategies for distresseddebt investors are “fix...

This paper studies the effects that heterogeneous multiple bank financing hason a firm’s risk- and information-policy, particularly with respect to credit rene-gotiation efficiency. We find that a significant, yet limited, degree of relationshiplending enables firms with high asset specificity...

Most previous research on efficiency in banking takes a regulatory perspective. In contrast,this paper investigates the empirical relation between efficiency and profitability in five largeeconomies of the European Union during the period 1998-2005 and discusses the results fromthe perspective...

Neuroeconomics stays in the center of the ongoing naturalistic turn in economics. It portraysthe individual as a complex system of decision making mechanisms and modules. This resultsinto a conceptual tension with the standard economic notion of the unity of the actor that is asystemic property...

This paper examines the financing structure of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) inGermany and questions whether an equity gap – or, more generally, a financing gap - exists.Reviewing the literature and available data sources, we find that financing constraints seem toaffect, if at...

Economics is increasingly adopting the methodological standards and procedures of the naturalsciences. The paper analyzes this ‘naturalistic turn’ from the philosophical perspective onnaturalism, and I discuss the implications for the field of finance. The theory of finance is aninteresting...

Innovations in the finance industry are an important tool to enhance profitability and to increase anation's wealth. It, therefore, is not astonishing that there is much empirical work on innovations infinance. Most of the work however is concerned with the design of innovative products. The...

SMEs play a crucial role for European economies. The numbers show the high importance ofSMEs for national economies. Accordingly, it is no surprise that the regulatory frameworkSMEs are imbedded in is the subject of an important political discussion. In the discussion itis frequently mentioned...

This paper studies ’Stylised Facts’ and ’Determinants’ of short-and long-termCDS-spreads of banks. As short-term spreads we choose 6M-, as long-termspreads we choose 5Y-spreads. In the section ’Stylised Facts’ we found thatthe correlation between short- and long-term spreads for the...

China’s banking market is one of the most attractive investment targets for financial institutionsworldwide especially since the opening up of the market in December 2006. Based oninterviews with experts this paper analyses the question of benefits and risks of foreign directinvestments into...