The Black’s leverage effect hypothesis postulates that a negative stock return innovation increases the financial leverage of a firm since the value of equity decreases at a given level of debt, which, in turn, creates a higher equity return volatility in the future. The paper is aimed at...

Leverage is often seen as villain in financial crises. Sudden deleveraging may lead to fire sales and price pressure when asset demand is downward-sloping. This paper looks at the effects of changes in leverage on asset prices. It provides a historical case study where a large, well-identified...