A bidding process can be organized so that offers are submitted simultaneously or sequentially. In the latter case, potential buyers can condition their behavior on previous entrants' decisions. The relative performance of these mechanisms is investigated when entry is costly and selective,...

We estimate the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on business failures among small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) in seventeen countries using a large representative firm-level database. We use a simple model of firm cost-minimization and measure each firm's liquidity shortfall during and after...

This paper assesses the prospects of a 2021 time bomb in SME failures triggered by the generous support policies enacted during the 2020 COVID-19 crisis. Policies implemented in 2020, on their own, do not create a 2021 "time-bomb" for SMEs. Rather, business failures and policy costs remain...

In a model that is consistent with the existence of a home bias and with foreign investors that are less informed than domestic investors, we show that unexpectedly high worldwide returns lead to net equity inflows into small countries. In addition, a small country experiences net equity inflows...

Learning by exporting refers to the mechanism whereby firms improve their performance (productivity) after entering export markets. Although this mechanism is often mentioned in policy documents, a significant share of econometric studies has not found evidence for this hypothesis. This paper...

In this paper, we propose an extension of the productivity decomposition method developed by Olley & Pakes (1996). This extension provides an accounting for the contributions of both firm entry and exit to aggregate productivity changes. It breaks down the contribution of surviving firms into a...