Corporate Debt and Distress Risk in Emerging Markets

This dissertation consists of two papers in the field of international finance, both under the general theme of corporate distress in emerging markets. In the first paper, I explore how the leverage and size of emerging market firms relates to their financial fragility. I also show that idiosyncratic shocks to large firms have macroeconomic effects. In the second paper, I estimate an emerging market-specific measure of distress risk and explore its asset pricing implications. I find that global financial conditions help explain changes in firms’ probability of default, and that distressed stocks earn a premium over their safer counterparts.Doctor of Philosoph

Lessons Unlearned? Corporate Debt in Emerging Markets

This paper documents a set of stylized facts about leverage and financial fragility in the nonfinancial corporate sector in emerging markets since the Global Financial Crisis (GFC). Corporate debt vulnerability indicators prior to the Asian Financial Crisis (AFC) attributed to corporate financial roots provide a benchmark for comparison. The firm-level data suggest that emerging markets post-GFC have lower leverage ratios than the five Asian crisis countries (Asian Five) in the run-up to the AFC. However, a broader set of emerging market countries show weaker liquidity, solvency, and profitability indicators. More countries are also in the Altman Z-score's “grey zone”, that is, at risk for corporate distress. Regression estimates confirm that leading up to the AFC and in the aftermath of the GFC, firms with higher leverage have Z-scores that are closer to the financial distress range. The data also corroborate two macro-related hypotheses: first, that leverage interacted with currency depreciation had a statistically significant adverse impact on Z-scores in pre-AFC; and second, that in countries with higher GDP growth leverage is correlated with less corporate financial fragility. Consistent with Gabaix (2011) the paper finds a granularity effect in that large firms are systemically important—idiosyncratic shocks to large firms significantly correlate with GDP growth in our emerging markets sample. Also, the more-levered large firms are more vulnerable to exchange rate shocks than smaller firms with comparable levels of leverage. While this result holds for the average country in our sample, there is substantial cross-country heterogeneity

Assessing the Mobility of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 Spike Protein Glycans by Structural and Computational Methods

Two years after its emergence, the coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) remains difficult to control despite the availability of several vaccines. The extensively glycosylated SARS-CoV-2 spike (S) protein, which mediates host cell entry by binding to the angiotensin converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) through its receptor binding domain (RBD), is the major target of neutralizing antibodies. Like to many other viral fusion proteins, the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein utilizes a glycan shield to thwart the host immune response. To grasp the influence of chemical signatures on carbohydrate mobility and reconcile the cryo-EM density of specific glycans we combined our cryo-EM map of the S ectodomain to 4.1 Å resolution, reconstructed from a limited number of particles, and all-atom molecular dynamics simulations. Chemical modifications modeled on representative glycans (defucosylation, sialylation and addition of terminal LacNAc units) show no significant influence on either protein shielding or glycan flexibility. By estimating at selected sites the local correlation between the full density map and atomic model-based maps derived from molecular dynamics simulations, we provide insight into the geometries of the α-Man-(1→3)-[α-Man-(1→6)-]-β-Man-(1→4)-β-GlcNAc(1→4)-β-GlcNAc core common to all N-glycosylation sites

Pneumonia treated in the internal medicine department: Focus on healthcare-associated pneumonia

Patients with pneumonia treated in the internal medicine department (IMD) are often at risk of healthcare-associated pneumonia (HCAP). The importance of HCAP is controversial. We invited physicians from 72 IMDs to report on all patients with pneumonia hospitalized in their department during 2weeks (one each in January and June 2010) to compare HCAP with community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) and hospital-acquired pneumonia (HAP). We analysed 1002 episodes of pneumonia: 58.9% were CAP, 30.6% were HCAP and 10.4% were HAP. A comparison between CAP, HCAP and HAP showed that HCAP patients were older (77, 83 and 80.5years; p<0.001), had poorer functional status (Barthel 100, 30 and 65; p<0.001) and had more risk factors for aspiration pneumonia (18, 50 and 34%; p<0.001). The frequency of testing to establish an aetiological diagnosis was lower among HCAP patients (87, 72 and 79; p<0.001), as was adherence to the therapeutic recommendations of guidelines (70, 23 and 56%; p<0.001). In-hospital mortality increased progressively between CAP, HCAP and HAP (8, 19 and 27%; p<0.001). Streptococcus pneumoniae was the main pathogen in CAP and HCAP. Pseudomonas aeruginosa and methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) caused 17 and 12.3% of HCAP. In patients with a confirmed aetiological diagnosis, the independent risk factors for pneumonia due do difficult-to-treat microorganisms (Enterobacteriaceae, P. aeruginosa or MRSA) were HCAP, chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases and higher Port Severity Index. Our data confirm the importance of maintaining high awareness of HCAP among patients treated in IMDs, because of the different aetiologies, therapy requirements and prognosis of this population. © 2011 The Authors. Clinical Microbiology and Infection © 2011 European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases