Using a database of more than 180,000 private companies from 2000 to 2009, we find that the benefits of holding more cash vary substantially with a firm’s size and the conditions it faces. Cash holdings matter most for small firms: when there are negative shocks to industry or macroeconomic...

This paper examines the financial policies and balance sheet adjustment of companies. Using a large panel of quoted UK firms, we estimate models for dividends, new equity issuance and investment, relating them to debt adjustment. The results suggest that while dividends are sticky in the short...

This paper examines the dividend policies of firms in Spain. Using firm-level panel data, models are estimated for dividend omissions as functions of financial characteristics, whilst also considering a role for persistence. The results are consistent with a tax discrimination model in which...

This paper studies two aspects of the behaviour of provincial relative prices in Spain: the relevance and the nature of provincial inflation divergences and relative price shifts. Inflation differentials are found to be small (the range is less than half point per year in the long-run), but...

The removal of barriers to trade and mobility is usually promoted as it allows for greater division of labor and, thereby, for improved economic welfare. Recent theory, however, suggests that the integration of markets might have serious consequences for the regional allocation of economic...

Spain faces the highest unemployment rate among the European Union countries (22.2%), and Portugal the lowest (7.3%). However, superficially, these two countries share common labour market features: they both have the most stringent job security rules in the OECD, the architecture of their...

We provide evidence on the fit of the New Phillips Curve (NPC) for the Euro area over the period 1970-1998, and use it as a tool to compare the characteristics of European inflation dynamics with those observed in the U.S. We also analyse the factors underlying inflation inertia by examining the...

Este documento ocasional recoge dos textos que el autor ha publicado recientemente en memoria de Luis Ángel Rojo, cuya vida profesional estuvo estrechamente vinculada al Banco de España y que falleció en mayo de 2011. El primer artículo es la contribución del autor a un libro colectivo, que...

This paper looks at whether the tendency of some governments to borrow short term is reinforced by financial support from the International Monetary Fund. I first present a model of sovereign debt issuance at various maturities featuring endogenous liquidity crises and maturity mismatches due to...

This paper analyses the impact that firms' financial position has on investment decisions using panel data from a large sample of non-financial corporations (around 120,000 firms) in six euro area countries (Belgium, Germany, France, Italy, the Netherlands and Spain). The results indicate that...