Most previous research on efficiency in banking takes a regulatory perspective. In contrast,this paper investigates the empirical relation between efficiency and profitability in five largeeconomies of the European Union during the period 1998-2005 and discusses the results fromthe perspective...

Funds of Hedge Funds (FHF) are perceived to be the premier choice of institutional investorsfor first-time allocations into the alternative investment asset class. While many papers coverthe bright side of FHF investing, we in this paper empirically investigate the maximum drawdownsof FHF....

Despite the common view that there is inherently a relationship of confliction, it is now impossibleto imagine the financing of family-owned enterprises in Germany without the alternativemethod of Private Equity financing. Based on a survey on Private Equity in familyowned companies specialising...

This paper examines the financing structure of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) inGermany and questions whether an equity gap – or, more generally, a financing gap - exists.Reviewing the literature and available data sources, we find that financing constraints seem toaffect, if at...

This article analyses the recent Leica judgement of the Higher Regional Court Frankfurt/Mainand its consequences. In this judgement, the court has established an infringement of specialformal requirements with respect to Leica´s invitation to the Annual General Meeting which,if correct, would...

Since summer 2007 the Subprime credit crisis has been affecting the international financialmarkets. One of the consequences of the crisis was the collapse of the market for large-sizedleveraged buyout transactions in late 2007 and early 2008.The goal of this Working Paper is to examine to what...

In 2004 the Basel Committee published an extensive revision of the capital charges whichcreates more risk sensitive capital requirements for banks. The New Accord called “InternationalConvergence of Capital Measurement and Capital Standard” provides in its first pillarfor a finer measurement...

This paper tracks a structured financial innovation, the commercial mortgage-backed securitywhich is not as novel as current discussion around the sub-prime crisis let assume. However,CMBS as credit-derivatives feature various factors that influence the risks arising from acommercial-mortgage...

This report analyses the possibility to outflank disclosure obligations under the German SecuritiesTrading Act as well as the German Takeover Act by using derivative instruments in thecontext of the attack of Schaeffler KG on Continental AG.Irrespective of a limited knowledge of the complete...

Tax fraud is a serious problem for fiscal authorities worldwide, not only in countries regarded as “hightax”like Germany. Besides long-term tax reforms, tax amnesties are used to bring back taxableamounts into the legal sector. The German tax amnesty of 2004/2005 was one of the last examples...