This Paper reports a new test of capital structure theories. It uses a filtering technique to identify large investment spikes. We find that the spikes are predominantly financed with debt by large firms and by new equity by small loss-making firms. In the process, firms move significantly away...

The literature on financial imperfections and business cycles has focused on propagation mechanisms. In this paper we model a pure reversion mechanism, such that the economy may converge to a two-period equilibrium cycle. This mechanism confirms that financial imperfections may have a dramatic...

We argue that ceteris paribus, introducing a habit that resolves the equity premium puzzle is equivalent to increasing the coefficient of relative risk aversion. Thus, if habit is modeled subject to the constraint that the Arrow-Pratt coefficient of relative risk aversion is held at a constant...

In 2002, a new legislation that harmonises insolvency laws within the EU came into effect. I find reasons – both theoretical and empirical – to doubt whether the new law has achieved the goal of decreasing the cost of cross-border insolvency and borrowing. I thus suggest an...

How do firms finance large cash flow requirements? We examine this in the context of firms that are subject to substantial cash flow requirements. We find that trade credit, inventory and cash stock reductions are all important in the short term for mild requirements. Larger and longer cash flow...

The effect of taxes on interest earned upon capital accumulation and inflation is discussed within an overlapping generations model. It is shown that an increase in such a tax is likely to reduce both the capital stock and the inflation rate. The model is extended to include the case of a small,...

This article reviews the development of corporate finance from domestic analyses to international comparisons of financial systems, to comparative corporate governance, to law and finance, and most recently to politics and finance. It describes how both theoretical developments and empirical...