This paper examines the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on stock returns, CDS and economic activity in the US and the five European countries (the UK, Germany, France, Italy, and Spain) which have been most affected. The sample period covers the dates from the first confirmed COVID-19 cases in...

The risk of recurrent outbreaks following the main waves of a pandemic has been acknowledged. We provide evidence of the scale and duration of this outbreak risk. We compile municipal public health records and use national data to model the stochastic process of mortality rates after the main...

We study the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic on productivity by matching firm performance outcomes with corresponding firm-level information on government support. Our cross-country evidence for five EU countries shows that the pandemic led to a significant short-term decline in...