Implications of the recent financial crisis for firm innovation

This paper shifts the focus of discussion on the 2008 financial crisis from the problems of the financial sector to its effects on the real economy. We step back from the immediate facts of the crisis to consider the reason for finance and its importance in firm innovation, both theoretically and historically, and argue that (1) innovation has special financing requirements, being dependent on equity finance, and (2) while stock markets have promoted innovation in the past, the financialization of enterprises has changed the relation between stock prices and innovation, with adverse consequences for the growth of economies.