Equity prices, productivity growth and the "new economy"

The increase in equity prices over the 1990s has to a large degree been attributed to permanently higher productivity growth that is derived from the ‘new economy’ and related research and development (R&D) expenditures. This paper establishes a rational expectations model of technology innovations and equity prices, which shows that under plausible assumptions, productivity advances can only have temporary effects on fundamentals of equity prices. Using data on R&D capital and fixed capital productivity for 11 OECD countries, the evidence give strong support for the model by suggesting that technology innovations indeed have only temporary effects on equity return

Dependence on External Finance by Manufacturing Sector: Examining the Measure and its Properties

Rajan & Zingales (1998) use U.S. Compustat firm data for the 1980s to obtain measures of manufacturing sectors’ Dependence on External Finance (DEF). They take any differences in these measures to be structural/technological and thus applicable to other countries. Their joint assumptions about how to obtain representative values of DEF by sector and about why these values differ between sectors have been used widely to show that sectors benefit unequally from a country’s level of financial development. However, the assumptions as such have not been examined. The present study, conducted with cyclically adjusted annual DEF measures, attempts to do so using U.S. industry data for 1977-1997 aggregated by sector. The key findings are that structural/ technological variables have low explanatory power for DEF and that the DEF figures calculated from micro data do not correspond closely to what is obtained from aggregate data. Hence assumptions crucial for RZ's argumentation have not been validated.Growth and finance, financial development, industry structure

What drives EU banks’ stock returns? Bank-level evidence using the dynamic dividend-discount model

We combine the dynamic dividend-discount model with an accounting-based vector autoregression framework that allows for a decomposition of EU banks' stock returns to cash-flow and expected return news components. The main findings are that while the bulk of the variability of EU banks' stock returns is due to cash flow shocks, the expected return shocks are relatively more important for larger than for smaller banks. Moroever, variables used in the literature as cash-flow proxies explain a higher share of the cash-flow component of the total excess returns for smaller than for larger EU banks. This suggests that large banks could be more prone to market wide news and events - that in the literature are associated with the expected return news component - as opposed to the bank-specific news, typically assumed to be incorporated in the cash-flow component. JEL Classification: C33, G12, G21Bank stock return predictability, cash flow news, panel VAR estimation, return decomposition

The Only Game in Town: Stock-Price Consequences of Local Bias

Theory suggests that, in the presence of local bias, the price of a stock should be decreasing in the ratio of the aggregate book value of firms in its region to the aggregate risk tolerance of investors in its region. We test this proposition using data on U.S. Census regions and states, and find clear-cut support for it. Most of the variation in the ratio of interest comes from differences across regions in aggregate book value per capita. Regions with low population density--e.g., the Deep South--are home to relatively few firms per capita, which leads to higher stock prices via an "only-game-in-town" effect. This effect is especially pronounced for smaller, less visible firms, where the impact of location on stock prices is roughly 12 percent.

Indices that capture creative destruction: questions and implications

The paper argues that micro and macro economists interested in the dynamics of creative destruction can gain important insights by using indices that capture the effect of innovation on the relative position of firms. This is due to the uneven and 'destructive' effect that radical innovation has on firm rankings. One such index is the market share instability index. On the financial side, the excess volatility of stock prices and idiosyncratic risk also appear to capture the uneven dynamics of creative destruction. The paper concludes by considering the implications of these propositions for economy-wide growth during periods of radical innovation (e.g. GPTs)

Corporate tax policy, entrepreneurship and incorporation in the EU

In Europe, declining corporate tax rates have come along with rising tax-to-GDP ratios. This paper explores to what extent income shifting from the personal to the corporate tax base can explain these diverging developments. A panel of European data on firm births and legal form of business was used to analyze income shifting via increased entrepreneurship and incorporation. The results suggest that lower corporate taxes exert an ambiguous effect on entrepreneurship. The effect on incorporation is significant and large. It implies that the revenue effects of lower corporate tax rates - possibly induced by tax competition -- partly show up in lower personal tax revenues rather than lower corporate tax revenues. Simulations suggest that between 10% and 17% of corporate tax revenue can be attributed to income shifting. Income shifting is found to have raised the corporate tax-to-GDP ratio by some 0.2%-points since the early 1990s.Corporate tax, Personal tax, Entrepreneurship, Incorporation, Income shifting, de Mooij, Nicodème

DETERMINANTS OF LOAN AGREEMENT IN ASIA-PACIFIC

This study aims to investigates and analyze the interdependencies of three main variables of loan agreement. The three main variables are: collateral, maturity, and loan spread. This research is applied in Asia-Pacific corporate area between 2006 and 2010. This study used two stage least square regression analysis. This research used 6 models to describe the interdependencies of collateral, maturity, and loan spread to determine the loan agreement. This study used secondary data in the Dealscan database with 548 samples of Asia-Pacific corporates in 2006-2010. This study shows interdependencies of collateral, maturity, and loan spread. This research reveals that the main variable which affects the loan agreement consideration is collateral

Dividend Taxes, Corporate Investment, and "Q"

Taxes on corporate distributions have traditionally been regarded as a "double tax" on corporate income. This view implies that while the total effective tax rate on corporate source income affects real economic decisions, the distribution of this tax burden between the shareholders and the corporation is irrelevant. Recent research has suggested an alter- native to this traditional view. One explanation of why firms in the U.S. pay dividends in spite of the heavy tax liabilities associated with this form of distribution is that the stock market capitalizes the tax payments associated with corporate distributions. This capitalization leaves investors indifferent at the margin between corporations paying our dividends and retaining earnings. This alternative view holds that while changes in the dividend tax rate will affect shareholder wealth, they will have no impact on corporate investment decisions. This paper develops econometric tests which distinguish between these two views of dividend taxation. By extending Tobin's "q" theory of investment to incorporate taxes at both the corporate and personal levels, the implications of each view for corporate investment decisions can be derived. The competing views may be tested by comparing the performance of investment equations estimates under each theory's predict ions. British time series data are particularly appropriate for testing hypotheses about dividend taxes because of the substantial postwar variation in effective tax rates on corporate distributions. The econometric results suggest that dividend taxes have important effects on investment decisions.

Effects of financial and non-financial information disclosure on prices’ mechanisms for emergent markets: The case of Romanian Bucharest Stock Exchange

The issuance of the European Union Regulation (EC) 1606/2002 and the 2007 adoption of the Markets and Financial Instruments Directive in Romania determined us to sett the goal of the present study at investigating the impact of public information disclosure on market values in the case of the Romanian companies listed on Bucharest Stock Exchange. Our focus is mainly on comparing the value relevance of Internet disclosed information provided by annual and interim financial reports and other non-financial news in the decision making process of investors. Consistent with the literature, we anticipate a positive and significant incremental relevance of such information items, even if an important non-uniformity of prices’ adjustments can be expected. In order to have a benchmark for our results, we compare these with the ones specific to a more developed market, the Madrid Stock Exchange. Empirical tests support our research hypothesis according to which there will be a relative incremental value of a higher volume and a better quality of information, reflecting prices’ overreactions even in the case of a market with imperfect trading mechanisms.KEY WORDS Disclosure, Valuation, Bucharest Stock Exchange, Madrid Stock Exchange