When the debt of firms in distress is dispersed, a restructuring agreement is difficult to reach because of free riding. We develop a repeated game in which banks come across each other frequently, allowing them to threaten a punishment in case of free riding. As the number of lending banks...

We explore Lithuanian credit register data and two bank closures to provide a novel estimate of firms' bank-switching costs and a novel identification of the hold-up problem. We show that when a distressed bank's closure forced firms to switch, these firms started borrowing at lower interest...

We use data on financially distressed Chinese companies in order to study a debt market where property rights are crudely defined and poorly enforced. To help with identification we use an event where a business-friendly province published new guidelines regarding the administration and...

In the recent theoretical literature on lending risk, the coordination problem in multi-creditor relationships have been analyzed extensively. We address this topic empirically, relying on a unique panel data set that includes detailed credit-file information on distressed lending relationships...

We develop a tractable model of strategic debt renegotiation in which businesses are sequentially interconnected through their liabilities. This financing structure, which we refer to as a "debt chain", gives rise to externalities, as a lender's willingness to provide concessions to his...

We study the restructuring process of small and medium-sized firms in financial distress. We have a unique dataset with firms in the Netherlands that are assisted in their restructuring effort by banks. Part of our dataset consists of firms that successfully restructure their operations and...

The European Commission has proposed a directive on ‘preventive restructuring frameworks' for financially distressed firms. I demonstrate that the proposal is flawed because it creates a refuge for failing firms that should be liquidated, because it rules out going concern sales for viable...

Company bankruptcies are an inseparable element of market economy. We may observe the tendency to view bankruptcy as a problem of weak and usually small entities facing problems when trying to meet the challenge posed by strong competition. Big companies, however, also fall, and their bankruptcy...