Employing data from a unique firm survey, this article examines small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) financing in Japan during the global financial crisis. The major findings of the article are two-fold. First, in terms of credit availability, loans extended by main banks were the “first...

The current economic crisis of Japan may be attributed largely to the dysfunction of the corporate goverance system. The post-war break-up of Zaibatsu family trusts resulted in management control. The President has shielded himself from the discipline of the capital market through...

The 1993 Japanese financial system reform allowed banks to enter the underwriting market for corporate bonds through bank-owned security subsidiaries. This paper examines empirically whether underwriting commissions and spreads for corporate bonds fell as a result of this bank entry. The...