This study investigates whether fluctuations in credit supply in a macroeconomy and a relational bank's financial condition affect the capital structure adjustment of firms. Using data for Japanese listed firms from 1988 to 2014, we find that firms adjust their capital structure slower during...

During both the 2008 and the COVID crises, aggregate employment in Europe and the US fell despite continuing growth in the aggregate capital stock. Using more than one million firm-year observations of small and medium European firms between 2003 and 2018, this paper introduces new stylized...

Since the early 1990s an unprecedented process of consolidation has taken place in the banking sector in most industrialised countries raising concern of policymakers that it may reduce access to credit for the small business sector. While most of the existing empirical studies have focused on...

This article tests the hypothesis that financial supply-side shifts help to explain the low-investment climate of private firms in Germany. The core contention is that a firm's financial position contributes to its access to external finance on credit markets. Special emphasis is put on small...