In the Belle Époque, Belgium recorded an unprecedented trade boom, but growth in output per capita was lackluster. We seek to reconcile this ostensible paradox. Because of the sharp decline in both fixed and variable trade costs, the trade boom was as much about the expansion in the number of...

The reasons why organizations sponsor artistic and cultural events have attracted much scholarly attention. However, the subject of why organizations create and develop their own collections has been under-investigated. This is especially striking in the financial sector, where several companies...

For gold, moving from clandestine to official trading does not significantly change informational efficiency. Both markets are inefficient suggesting that efficiency is linked more to the type of asset than to the legal status of the market.

History provides many insights to address the issue of sovereign debt defaults. This article first presents a detailed account of defaults in historical perspective. It then discusses the solutions devised in the past to address sovereign debt crises and puts these into perspective with...