I investigate the role of economic policy uncertainty (EPU), proxied by the news-based measure of Baker et al. (2016), in the cross-section of individual stock returns in 23 countries. I estimate a stock's beta toward its country-specific EPU index (βEPU) and show that stocks in the lowest...

This paper analyzes the determinants of returns generated by European private equity funds. It starts from the presumption that this asset class is characterized by illiquidity, stickiness and segmentation. As a consequence, Gompers and Lerner (2000) have shown that venture deal valuations are...

This paper presents a cash flow based analysis of the return and risk characteristics of European Private Equity Funds. For that purpose a comprehensive data set has been provided by Thomson Venture Economics. We document the typical time pattern of cash flows for European private equity funds....

In this study we use a sample of 332 European mid-market buy-out transactions initiated by private equity firms over the period 1990 to 2011. The focus of this research is to identify and quantify the value creation drivers in buy-out transactions. For that purpose we use a novel methodology for...

We test the Fama-French three-factor model for a large international data set using an alternative proxy for expected returns - the implied cost of capital (ICC). The implied risk premiums of the three factors are all highly significant. Also, the cross-country variation of each of the three...

This paper investigates determinants and consequences of net asset value discounts in listed private equity funds. Listed private equity funds share characteristics of closed-end mutual funds and traditional unlisted private equity funds and can therefore offer insights into both. Our results...