This paper analyses investment strategies of three types of institutional investors pension funds, life insurers and non-life insurers over the period 1999-2005. We use balance sheet and cash flow data, including purchases and sales of equity, fixed income and real estate. We trace asset...

This article questions received wisdom that the benefits of microfinance start with poverty reduction and are subsequently followed by social emancipation. Taking the case of Uganda and by using a consensual people-centred relevance test to assess the impact of microfinance on poverty...

We estimate the incremental financing decision for a sample of some 150 Dutch companies for the years 1984 through 1997, thereby distinguishing internal finance and three types of external finance: bank borrowing, bond issues and share issues. First, we estimate a multinomial logit model which...

This paper examines the response of the economies of 11 EU countries, Japan, and the United States to shocks in housing and equity prices. The effects are assessed with a Structural Vector Auto Regressive (SVAR) model, and four key findings emerge. First, the impacts of asset price shocks are...

This study presents empirical evidence on the influence of sponsoring companies on the funding and portfolio allocation of pension funds, an issue on which most extant literature is theoretical. We use a unique microdataset of 550 Dutch defined benefit company pension funds and 100 sponsoring...

We investigate the capital structure of 350 Dutch insurers during the period 1995-2005. Our main findings are: (1) a small company size, a mutual organisation, high profitability, large equity investments, and being a fire insurer, all contribute to higher solvency margins; (2) minimum solvency...