We study the implications of hedging for firm financing and investment. We do so using an extensive, hand-collected dataset on corporate hedging activities. Hedging can lower the odds of negative firm realizations, reducing the expected costs of financial distress. In theory, this should ease a...

Building on the pioneering study by Beck, Demirguc-Kunt, and Levine (2006), this study examines the effects of media ownership and concentration on corruption in bank lending using a unique World Bank data set covering more than 5,000 firms across 59 countries. We find strong evidence that state...

This article identifies an important channel through which excess control rights affect firm value. Using a new, hand-collected data set on corporate ownership and control of 3,468 firms in 22 countries during the 1996-2008 period, we find that the cost of debt financing is significantly higher...

The contributors – top international scholars from finance, law and business – explore the role of governance, both internal and external, in explaining risk-taking and other aspects of the behavior of financial institutions. Additionally, they discuss market and policy features...

type="main" <title type="main">ABSTRACT</title> <p>Tax evasion is a widespread phenomenon across the globe and even an important factor in the ongoing sovereign debt crisis. We show that firms in countries with better credit information–sharing systems and higher branch penetration evade taxes to a lesser degree. This...</p>

type="main" <title type="main">ABSTRACT</title> <p>This paper analyzes whether the political connections of listed firms in the United States affect the cost and terms of loan contracts. Using a hand-collected data set of the political connections of S&P 500 companies over the 2003–2008 time period, we find that the cost...</p>

The recent global financial crisis has spurred renewed interest in identifying those reforms in bank regulation that would work best to promote bank development, performance and stability. Building upon three recent world-wide surveys on bank regulation (Barth et al., 2004, 2006, 2008), we...

There is a well-established methodology for measuring the effects of economic policy in a model that is `causal' or backward-looking. In this paper a complementary methodology is described for the case in which the model is `non-causal' or forward-looking. The methodology is then applied to an...

Since the beginning of 1990s, the credit balance of the banking system in mainland China has experienced a big swing from negative to positive. The balance has continued to expand up to now. It seems that both negative and positive credit balances are so large that the financial resources have...