We consider a model in which the principal-agent relation between inside shareholders and the management affects the firm value.We study the effect of financing the project with risky debt in changing the incentive for a risk-neutral shareholder (the principal) to implement the project-value...

In 2001, government guarantees for savings banks in Germany were removed following a law suit. We use this natural experiment to examine the effect of government guarantees on bank risk taking, using a large data set of matched bank/borrower information. The results suggest that banks whose...

We study a credit market with adverse selection and moral hazard where sufficient sorting is impossible. The crucial novel feature is the competition between lenders in their choice of contracts offered. Qualities of investment projects are not observable by banks and investment decisions of...

Integrated financial markets provide opportunities for expansion and improved risk sharing, but also pose threats of contagion risk through cross-border exposures. This paper examines cross-border contagion risk over the period 1999-2006. To that purpose we use aggregate cross-border exposures...

In this paper we evaluate applications of (return based) style analysis.The portfolio and positivity constraints imposed by style analysis are useful in constructing mimicking portfolios without short positions.Such mimicking portfolios can be used, e.g., to construct efficient portfolios of...

We develop a theory and empirical test of how the legal system affects the relationship between venture capitalists and entrepreneurs. The theory uses a double moral hazard framework to show how optimal contracts and investor actions depend on the quality of the legal system. The empirical...

This paper studies how credit constraints develop over bank relationships. I analyze a unique dataset of matched loan application and loan contract information and measure credit constraints as the ratio of requested to granted loan amounts. I find that the most important determinants of...

In this paper we show how style analysis of mutual funds can be used to circumvent the problem of self-reported investment styles, and to improve relative performance evaluation. Subsequently, we relate style analysis to performance evaluation and present results on the performance of Dutch...

The late-Victorian era was characteristed by especially close links between politicians and firms in the UK. Roughly half of all members of Parliament served as company directors, many as directors of multiple firms. We analyze 467 British companies over the period 1895 to 1904 to investigate...