I find that corporate European leverage variation between 2007 and 2015 is largely driven by firm and industry characteristics. Conventional, time-varying firm characteristics explain as much leverage variation as country and industry fixed effects combined. Cross-sectional leverage disparities...

We derive and develop a simple and intuitive model that shines fresh light on the relentless debate over whether corporate ownership converges to the Berle-Means modern corporation with high stock ownership dispersion. Our model takes into account the importance of both protective legal...

Addressing climate change as well as the role of banks in this process requires better measures about the exposures of firms and banks to climate related risks. We usually have data for large, publicly listed firms due to enhanced disclosure requirements. In this paper, we provide first...

An Optional European Contract Code in the Institutional Competition between European Contract Laws -- Assessment of the Desirability of an Optional European Contract Law -- Evaluation of the European Commission's Impact Assessment Accompanying the Proposal for a Regulation on a CESL.

This paper examines local bias in the context of venture capital (VC) investments. Based on a sample of US VC investments between 1980 and June 2009, we find more reputable VCs (older, larger, more experienced, and with stronger IPO track record) and VCs with broader networks exhibit less local...

We show that Quantitative Easing (QE) stimulates investment via a corporate-bond lending channel. Fed's large-scale asset purchases of MBS and treasuries through QE creates a vacuum of safe assets, prompting safer firms to invest more by issuing relatively "safe'' bonds. Using micro-data around...

Employing the staggered short-sale deregulation on the Chinese stock market as quasi-exogenous shocks, we find that short selling threats is associated with higher corporate default risk, especially for firms that are more financially constrained, with higher growth rates, and higher information...

This study investigates the effects of firm-level political risk on corporate investments and operating efficiencies for industrially diversified and focused firms. Using firm-level political risk data from Hassan et al.(2019), we document that both political risk and diversification lead to...