Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are the backbone of most Asian economies. The main obstacle to the development of the SME sector is the lack of stable finance. Considering the bank-dominated characteristic of economies in Asia, banks are the main source of financing, and the lack of a...

SMEs often have severe difficulties raising money. Considering the bank-dominated characteristic of economies in Asia, banks are the main source of financing. In order to prevent the accumulation of non-performing loans in the small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) sector, it is crucial for...

Prior research shows that technology spillovers across firms increase innovation, productivity, and value. We study how firms finance their own growth stimulated by technology spillovers from their technological peer firms. We find that greater technology spillovers lead to higher leverage. This...

This study evaluates infrastructure investment and finance in Asia from a global perspective. It provides an overview on infrastructure needs and the various sources of private finance, globally and within Asia, and creates a "bigger picture" for the demand and supply of capital for...

Peer-to-peer lending (P2PL) FinTech is growing rapidly in Indonesia. With its flexibility and simplicity, P2PL reduces the gap in financing that cannot be fulfilled by banks. However, the rapid development of P2PL also raises a number of problems that burden users such as unethical debt...

India has an estimated 26,000 startups, making it the third-largest startup ecosystem in the world, recording consolidated inflows of over $36 billion in the past 3 years with 26 "unicorns" - startups valued over $1 billion. The Indian startup ecosystem has expanded quite rapidly mainly through...

This paper analyzes the approaches adopted by institutional investors to manage climate risk in their portfolios and proposes policies to increase climate awareness in this large segment of the capital markets. Because of their size and their role as conduit of savers' climate concerns to the...

This paper investigates the impacts of defined-benefit (DB) pension plans on the corporate investment choices between diversifying and non-diversifying investments. We find a firm’s DB plan coverage is negatively associated with its propensity of making a major investment. Subject to a major...

Micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises are a backbone of the Philippine economy. One factor that hinders the growth of these enterprises is their difficulty in accessing finance from banks and other financial institutions. The Credit Surety Fund (CSF) was established to help these...

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are the backbone of the Asian economy. They make up more than 98% of all Asian businesses that provide two out of three private sector jobs in the region. Therefore, it is vitally important for Asia's economic success to have fully functioning support...