Germans are still very fond of using cash. Of all direct payment transactions, cash accounts for an astounding 82% in terms of number, and for 58% in terms of value. With a new and unique dataset that combines transaction information with survey data on payment behaviour of German consumers, we...

The contribution of this paper is to offer a rationale for the observed seasonal pattern in house prices. We first document seasonality in house prices for the US and the UK using formal statistical tests and illustrate its quantitative importance. In the second part of the paper we employ a...

In this paper we analyse whether the recording behaviour of consumers keeping a payment diary changes over the diary period. Using data from a large study on the payment behaviour of German consumers we find that individuals tend to report a higher number of transactions on the first day of the...

Standard transaction cost arguments can only partially explain why the share of cash transactions is still high in many countries. This paper shows that consumers' desire to monitor liquidity is one of the reasons. Consumers make use of a distinctive feature of cash - a glance into one's pocket...

Information economics has emerged as the primary theoretical lens for framing financing decisions in firm R&D investment. Successful outcomes of R&D projects are either ex-ante impossible to predict or the information is asymmetrically distributed between inventors and investors. As a result,...

This paper empirically investigates whether individuals withhold a certain amount of cash for precautionary reasons at the point-of-sale (POS) in order to be able to cover future transactions that might have to be paid for in cash. Such behaviour is costly for consumers because it imposes...

We measure consumers' use of cash by harmonizing payment diary surveys from seven countries: Australia, Austria, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United States (conducted 2009 through 2012). Our paper finds important cross-country differences, for example, the level of cash...

The Panel on Household Finances (PHF) is a new panel survey on household finances and wealth in Germany conducted by the Deutsche Bundesbank. It covers the balance sheets, pension claims, savings, incomes and work histories of households, together with some information on consumption patterns,...

Using the Household Finance and Consumption Survey (HFCS), a large micro-level dataset on households' wealth in fifteen euro area countries, this paper explores how households allocate their assets. We derive stylized facts on asset participation as well as levels of asset holdings and...

Multinational corporations (MNC) search increasingly for lead market knowledge and technological expertise around the globe. We investigate whether their subsidiaries gain access to these valuable sources of host country knowledge to the same degree as domestic rivals. We develop a theoretical...