In the last two decades, Internet technologies, such as cloud computing, mobile communications, social media, and big data analytics, have brought tremendous changes to our society and reshaped the business in various industries. Specifically, the mushrooming innovations in the financial area...

The Italian credit and financial system was the result of progressive developments that accelerated during the process of Italian unification. Our essay analyses the role of local private bankers in modernizing the economic and financial system of the country and the way in which the gradual...

Determinants of bid-ask spread have been explored significantly for low-frequency datasets in many developed markets. Researchers have identified share price, traded volume, market-capitalization, return volatility, and number of trades as the prime spread drivers. However, the validity of these...

This paper evaluates the impact of the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive II (MiFID II) regulation on information asymmetries. The microstructure models of Madhavan et al. (1997) and Glosten and Harris (1988) are adapted to estimate potential changes in the adverse selection component of...

This paper investigates whether the market level of information asymmetry affects firms' debt financing decisions. Using a sample of non-financial listed firms and a composite index based on microstructure measures of information asymmetry, we find that firms with more information asymmetry use...

We examine the relation between the gender diversity on boards of corporations and the levels of information asymmetry in the stock market. Prior evidence suggests that the presence of women on director boards increases the quantity and quality of public disclosure by firms, and we therefore...

Evaluating more than 317,000 discount certificates in the German secondary market, we find that premiums and spreads are endogenous and negatively related but depend on different key determinants. The fundamental determinants of the premiums are mainly profit-related, that is, dividends of the...