This article provides an introductory, yet comprehensive, business cycle analysis of firm financing. Using data from Compustat, we find that debt issuance is procyclical while the net sale of stock is countercyclical. However, an equity financing measure that includes stock compensation and...

The business cycle dynamics of firms' investment and debt maturity vary across the firm size and age distribution: Young and small firms have strongly pro-cyclical debt maturity and investment, old and large firms a-cyclical debt maturity and weakly pro-cyclical investment. This paper explores...

With business leverage at record levels, the effects of corporate debt overhang on growth and investment have become a prominent concern. In this paper, we study the effects of corporate debt overhang based on long-run cross-country data covering the near-universe of modern business cycles. We...

With business leverage at record levels, the effects of corporate debt overhang on growth and investment have become a prominent concern. In this paper, we study the effects of corporate debt overhang based on long-run cross-country data covering the nearuniverse of modern business cycles. We...

We study the leverage of U.S. firms over their life cycles and the connection between firm leverage, firm growth, and aggregate shocks. We construct a new dataset that combines private and public firms’ balance sheets with firm-level data from U.S. Census Bureau’s Longitudinal Business...