A central ambition of the Lisbon Agenda and Europe 2020 is promoting greater innovation in Europe. This paper investigates three questions: How have EU efforts to foster innovation affected innovation finance? How has European financial market integration affected innovation finance? And, are...

Design of contracts that define firms, and their accounting systems depends on the conditions in the firm's factor and product markets. We examine the fundamental difficulty of defining and developing "uniform" accounting for diverse economic environments across countries and compare the...

Since the 1990s, most European countries have adopted detailed corporate governance codes regulating listed companies. Even though the initial codes were designed against the backdrop of a particular jurisdiction, best practice standards have become remarkably similar across legal traditions....

Minority shareholdings have been on the regulatory agenda of competition authorities for some time. Recent empirical studies, however, draw attention to a new, thought provoking theory of harm: common ownership by institutional investors holding small, parallel equity positions in several...

When in 1860 Southern Italy was annexed to the Kingdom of Italy, it suddenly found itself within a larger national market characterised by high levels of public debt, a new currency and increased competition in banking. Monetary problems, the depreciation of public bonds and the loss of...

When in 1860 Southern Italy was annexed to the Kingdom of Italy, it suddenly found itself within a larger national market characterised by high levels of public debt, a new currency and increased competition in banking. Monetary problems, the depreciation of public bonds and the loss of...

Wenn man untersuchen möchte, ob sich die Finanzsysteme verschiedener Länder im Verlauf der letzten Jahre aneinander angeglichen haben oder demnächst angleichen werden, braucht man ein Konzept zur Beschreibung von Finanzsystemen, durch das wesentliche Strukturen, deren Unterschiede und...

In this paper we explore the relationship between the individual decision to become anentrepreneur and the institutional context. We pinpoint the critical roles of property rights andthe size of the state sector for entrepreneurial activity and test the relationships empirically bycombining...

A financial system can only perform its function of channelling funds from savers toinvestors if it offers sufficient assurance to the providers of the funds that they will reapthe rewards which have been promised to them. To the extent that this assurance is notprovided by contracts alone,...