In both the subprime crisis and the euro-area crisis, regulators imposed bans on short sales, aimed mainly at preventing stock price turbulence from destabilizing financial institutions. Contrary to the regulators' intentions, financial institutions whose stocks were banned experienced greater...

"This paper studies the decision of firms to extend trade credit to customers and its relation with their financing decisions. The authors use a novel firm-level database of Chinese SMEs with unique information on market power in both output and input markets and on the amount, terms, and...

Based on a sample of university students, we provide field and laboratory evidence that a small scale training intervention has both a statistically and economically significant effect on subjective and objective assessments of financial knowledge. We show also that the intervention increases...

In 2000 Italy replaced its traditional system of severance pay for public employees with a new system. Under the old regime, severance pay was proportional to the final salary before retirement; under the new regime it is proportional to lifetime earnings. This reform entails substantial losses...

We investigate the role of grandparental childcare for fertility decisions of their offspring. Exploiting pension reforms in Italy, we argue that delayed retirement represents a negative shock to the supply of informal childcare for the next generation. We show that, when the maternal...