This book is both a reference book on Germany's financial system and a contribution to the economic debate about its status at the beginning of the twenty-first century. In giving a comprehensive account of the many facets of the system, it covers corporate governance, relationship lending, stock market development, investor protection, the venture capital industry, and the accounting system, and reports on monetary transmission and the credit channel, regulation and banking competition, the insurance and investment industry, and mergers and acquisitions. Special chapters at the beginning and at the end of the book adopt the financial system perspective, analysing the mutual fit of different features of the financial system; and each of the fifteen chapters addresses particular myths that surround it. The book is invaluable for those who want to understand the German economy and its financial system, promising not only a compilation of facts and statistics on Germany's financial markets and institutions, but also an analysis of its current structure and the determinants of its future development. Contributors to this volume - Jan Pieter Krahnen Professor of Finance Goethe Universitat Frankfurt Reinhard H. Schmidt Professor of Finance Goethe Universitat Frankfurt Ralf Elsas Goethe Universitat Frankfurt Karl-Hermann Fischer Deutscher Sparkassen- und Giroverband e.V. Stefanie Franzke Center for Financial Studies Stefanie Grohs Verein fur Socialpolitik (German Economic Association) Andreas Hackethal Goethe Universitat Frankfurt Christian Laux Professor of Finance Goethe Universitat Frankfurt Prof. Dr. Christian Leuz Harold Stott Term Assistant Professor The Wharton School University of Pennsylvania Prof. Dr. Raimond Maurer Professor of Investment, Portfolio Management and Pension Finance Johann Wolfgang Goethe-University of Frankfurt Prof. Dr. Eric Nowak University of Southern Switzerland Lugano Dr. Christian Pfeil Staatskanzlei of the Saarland, Germany Oliver Rieckers Frank A. Schmid Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis Research Department Prof. Dr. Gerald Spindler Lehrstuhl fur Burgerliches Recht, Handels- und Wirtschaftsrecht Multimedia- und Telekommunikationsrecht, Rechtsvergleichung Juristische Fakultat Georg-August-Universitat Gottingen Prof. Dr. Erik Theissen Universitaet Bonn Marcel Tyrell Goethe Universitat Frankfurt Mark Wahrenburg Professor of Banking and Finance Goethe University Frankfurt Andreas Worms Deutsche Bundesbank Department of Economics Prof. Dr. Jens Wustemann, M.S.G. (Dauphine) Lehrstuhl fur Allgemeine Betriebswirtschaftslehre und Wirtschaftsprufung Fakultat fur Betriebswirtschaftslehre Universitat Mannheim
