This paper conducts a transatlantic comparison of market timing effects on corporate capital structures, using some 45,000 observations on US, UK, and continental European firms. We confirm the empirical regularity that leverage and historical market-to-book ratios connect negatively in the US,...

This study presents empirical evidence on the influence of sponsoring companies on the funding and portfolio allocation of pension funds, an issue on which most extant literature is theoretical. We use a unique microdataset of 550 Dutch defined benefit company pension funds and 100 sponsoring...

We investigate the capital structure of 350 Dutch insurers during the period 1995-2005. Our main findings are: (1) a small company size, a mutual organisation, high profitability, large equity investments, and being a fire insurer, all contribute to higher solvency margins; (2) minimum solvency...

Did ICT firms behave very differently from non-ICT firms during the global ICT boom-bust cycle on the stock markets? To answer this question we analyze the financial behavior of a sample of North-American and Western European firms during 1991-2002. We document that ICT firms are indeed what...

This empirical study revisits the determinants of firms' capital structures. The main focus thereby is onthe 'market timing theory', according to which the current level of the capital structure is the cumulative outcome of past attempts to `time the market', i.e. issuing shares when equity is...

Based on a data set for 19 OECD countries for the period 1981-2001, we estimate the impact of capital mobility (FDI) on corporate tax rates. So far the literature has been concerned with the related but rather different question as to the sensitivity of FDI to tax rates. Our paper takes an...

Population aging and pension reform will have profound effects on international capital markets. First, demographic change alters the time path of aggregate savings within each country. Second, this process may be amplified when a pension reform shifts old-age provision towards more pre-funding....

This paper develops and tests a theoretical model that allows for the endogenous decision of banks to engage in international and global banking. International banking, where banks raise capital in the home market and lend it abroad, is driven by differences in factor endowments across...

In this paper we investigate the impact of the balance between debt and equity finance on the financial stability of developing countries. Employing extreme bounds analysis to deal with model uncertainty, we estimate a model of an exchange rate pressure index depending on various financial...

d above may also more fully apply to the Thai case, since the experience of the other countries in the region is probably tainted by contagion effects of the Thai baht crisis (Baig and Goldfajn 1999).