We examine the returns to investors in publicly traded stock in new industries. We examine data from the United States on sellers of own-brand personal computers, airlines and airplane manufacturers, automobile manufacturers, railroads, and telegraphs. We find that a relatively small number of...

This article explains the roots of financial crises in one of the oldest and most fundamental problems of commercial law: hidden leverage. Common law courts wrestled with this problem for centuries and developed a time - tested solution: the doctrine of secret liens. If the debtor becomes...

If a lender can easily obtain more information about a borrower, under what conditions will he choose to do so? In this paper, I use a hand-collected set of records from the nineteenth century credit reporting agency, R.G. Dun & Company, that allows me to directly observe when lenders acquired...

How does banking competition affect credit provision and growth? How does it affect financial stability? In order to identify the causal effects of banking competition, we exploit a discontinuity in bank capital requirements during the 19th century National Banking Era. We show that banks...

We examine the returns to investors in publicly traded stock in new industries. We examine data from the United States on sellers of own-brand personal computers, airlines and airplane manufacturers, automobile manufacturers, railroads, and telegraphs. We find that a relatively small number of...

This article is written on the occasion of the bicentennial of the first state banks in North Carolina, and reviews the first one hundred years of banking in the state. The article is part of a larger project exploring the reasons for the remarkable success of North Carolina banks and attempting...

The objective of this paper is to examine the absolute and risk-adjusted effects on distribution rates and total wealth created by adding loss-limiting trend following strategies to buy and hold portfolios. Using 150 years of equity and bond data, we found that applying trend following to...

Financial crises, twice in so many decades, have exposed our monetary hardwiring as a critical issue of governance. That circuitry starts with a public unit – the dollar -- created and backed by the federal government, but it appoints commercial banks to amplify and spread that money at the...

This paper provides quantitative evidence on the interbank network’s role in transmitting the Panic of 1907 across the United States. Originating in a few New York City banks and trust companies, the panic led to payment suspensions and emergency currency issuance in many cities. Data on the...

This article explains the roots of financial crises in one of the oldest and most fundamental problems of commercial law: hidden leverage. Common law courts wrestled with this problem for centuries and developed a time – tested solution: the doctrine of secret liens. If the debtor becomes...