The aim of this paper is to examine what has been the role of information provision to the market throughout the crisis. We consider two main sources of information to the market, financial statements and information provided by credit rating agencies. We examine how these sources of information...

In an investigation of banks' loan pricing policies in the United States over the past two decades, this study finds supporting evidence for the bank risk-taking channel of monetary policy. We show that banks charge lower spreads when they lend to riskier borrowers relative to the spreads they...

This paper proposes a theoretical framework to analyze the relationship between credit shocks, firm defaults and volatility, and to study the impact of credit shocks on business cycle dynamics. Firms are identical ex ante but differ ex post due to different realizations of firm-specific...

The theory of the firm suggests that firms can respond to poor contract enforcement by vertically integrating their production process. The purpose of this paper is to examine whether firms' integration opportunities affect the way institutions determine international trade patterns. We find...

This paper examines inefficiencies arising from a lack of long-term contracting in small business lending in China. I develop and estimate a dynamic model where firms repeatedly interact with the same lender. All loans are short-term. Collateral can be used to deter a strategic default by a...

The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) under the Kyoto Protocol to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) enables industrialized countries to meet a part of their emission reduction requirements through purchase of emission reduction credits from projects in developing countries....

The recent financial crisis has led to a major debate about fair-value accounting. Many critics have argued that fair-value accounting, often also called mark-to-market accounting, has significantly contributed to the financial crisis or, at least, exacerbated its severity. In this paper, we...

This paper analyzes the risk-taking behavior of financial intuitions that have guarantees (e.g., banks with deposit insurance or Government Sponsored Enterprises with implicit guarantees) and/or institutions that find it beneficial to develop a reputation for not taking risk. For instance, banks...

This paper makes a detailed comparison of two major financial services in Singapore: life insurance and stockbrokerage. Relationships of perceptions and expectations of service quality, mean service adequacy (MSA) and mean service superiority (MSS) with service satisfaction and loyalty are...

China’s rampant environmental pollution problems and rising greenhouse gas emissions and the resulting climate change are undermining its long-term economic growth. China, from its own perspective cannot afford to and, from an international perspective, is not meant to continue on the...