The purpose of the paper is to examine the effect of founding-family control on the cost of bank debt. We examine the cost of accessing the syndicated market, and we use the financial crisis and the unexpected nature of Lehman Brother's collapse as a laboratory in order to tease out the effect...

This paper provides causal evidence on the impact of succession taxes on firm investment decisions and transfer of control. I exploit a 2002 policy change in Greece that substantially reduced the tax on intra-family transfers of businesses and show that succession taxes lead to more than a 40%...