Do banks propagate debt market shocks?

Over the years, U.S. banks have increasingly relied on the bond market to finance their business. This created the potential for a link between the bond market and the corporate sector whereby borrowers, including those that do not rely on bond funding, became exposed to the conditions in the bond market. We investigate the importance of this link. Our results show that when the cost to access the bond market goes up, banks that rely on bond financing charge higher interest rates on their loans. Banks that rely exclusively on deposit funding follow bond financing banks and increase the interest rates on their loans, though by smaller amounts. Further, banks pass the bond market shocks predominantly to their risky borrowers that have access to the bond market and to their borrowers that do not have access to the bond market. These results show that banks propagate shocks to the bond market by passing them through their loan policies to their borrowers, including those that do not use bond financing.Banks and banking ; Banks and banking - Costs ; Bond market

Banking and commerce: a liquidity approach

This paper looks at the advantages and disadvantages of mixing banking and commerce, using the "liquidity" approach to financial intermediation. Adding a commercial firm makes it easier for a bank to dispose of assets seized in a loan default. This "internal market" increases the liquidity of such assets and improves the bank's ability to perform financial intermediation. More generally, owning a commercial firm may act either as a substitute or a complement to commercial lending. In some cases, a bank will voluntarily refrain from making loans, choosing to become a nonbank bank in an unregulated environment.Nonbank financial institutions ; Bank liquidity

Large pseudoscalar Yukawa couplings in the complex 2HDM

We start by presenting the current status of a complex flavour conserving two-Higgs doublet model. We will focus on some very interesting scenarios where unexpectedly the light Higgs couplings to leptons and to b-quarks can have a large pseudoscalar component with a vanishing scalar component. Predictions for the allowed parameter space at end of the next run with a total collected luminosity of $300 \, fb^{-1}$ and $3000 \, fb^{-1}$ are also discussed. These scenarios are not excluded by present data and most probably will survive the next LHC run. However, a measurement of the mixing angle $\phi_\tau$, between the scalar and pseudoscalar component of the 125 GeV Higgs, in the decay $h \to \tau^+ \tau^-$ will be able to probe many of these scenarios, even with low luminosity. Similarly, a measurement of $\phi_t$ in the vertex $\bar t t h$ could help to constrain the low $\tan \beta$ region in the Type I model.Comment: 21 pages, 10 figure

Mass distribution and structural parameters of Small Magellanic Cloud star clusters

In this work, we estimate, for the first time, the total masses and mass function (MF) slopes of a sample of 29 young and intermediate-age Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) clusters from CCD Washington photometry. We also derive age, interstellar reddening and structural parameters for most of the studied clusters by employing a statistical method to remove the unavoidable field star contamination. Only these 29 clusters out of 68 originally analysed cluster candidates present stellar overdensities and coherent distribution in their colour–magnitude diagrams compatible with the existence of a genuine star cluster. We employed simple stellar population models to derive general equations for estimating the cluster mass based only on its age and integrated light in the B, V, I, C and T1 filter. These equations were tested against mass values computed from luminosity functions, showing an excellent agreement. The sample contains clusters with ages between 60 Myr and 3 Gyr and masses between 300 and 3000 M ⊙ distributed between ∼0$$_{.}^{\circ}5 and ∼2° from the SMC optical centre. We determined MF slopes for 24 clusters, of which 19 have slopes compatible with that of Kroupa's initial mass function (α = 2.3 ± 0.7), considering the uncertainties. The remaining clusters – H86-188, H86-190, K47, K63 and NGC 242 – showed flatter MFs. Additionally, only clusters with masses lower than ∼1000 M ⊙ and flatter MF were found within ∼0$ $_{.}^{\circ}6 from the SMC rotational centre.Fil: Maia, F.F.S.. Universidade Federal do Minas Gerais; BrasilFil: Piatti, Andres Eduardo. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Cordoba. Observatorio Astronomico de Cordoba; ArgentinaFil: Santos Jr., João F. C.. Universidade Federal do Minas Gerais; Brasi

Measuring the importance of the uniform nonsynchronization hypothesis

In this paper we critically reappraise some measures of the importance of time-dependent price setting rules and propose an alternative way to gauge the significance of this type of price setting behaviour. The merits of the proposed measure are highlighted in an application using micro-data. Our results suggest that a large proportion of price trajectories may be compatible with simple time-dependent price setting mechanisms but the strength of this evidence very much depends on the way that is used to evaluate the importance of this type of behaviour. JEL Classification: D40, E31, L11perfect synchronization, Time-dependent price setting models, uniform staggering

Time or state dependent price setting rules? Evidence from Portuguese micro data

In this paper we analyse the ability of time and state dependent price setting rules to explain durations of price spells or the probability of changing prices. Our results suggest that simple time dependent models cannot be seen as providing a reasonable approximation to the data and that state dependent models are required to fully characterise the price setting behaviour of Portuguese firms. Inflation, the level of economic activity and the magnitude of the last price change emerge as relevant variables affecting the probability of changing prices. Moreover, it is seen that the impact differs for negative and positive values of these covariates. JEL Classification: C41, D40, E31CPI data, Hazard functions, inflation

Space-time analysis of pulmonary tuberculosis hospitalizations in mainland Portugal (2002-2016)

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The Choice Between Corporate And Structured Financing: Evidence From New Corporate Borrowings

We examine the factors that influence non-financial firms’ choice between corporate financing (CF) and structured finance (SF). Using a sample of 4,970 Western European deals closed between 2000 and 2016, we find that floatation costs, information asymmetry, and renegotiation and liquidation risks affect firms’ financing decisions. Findings also suggest that firms choose SF when they are less creditworthy and seek long-term financing, and that firms resorting to project finance are smaller and less profitable and have lower short-term debt, lower asset tangibility, and less growth opportunities than corporate bond issuers have. Firms that prefer asset securitization to corporate bonds tend to be smaller, more levered, and less profitable and have lower proportions of fixed assets. Finally, findings are consistent with the hypothesis that firms choose asset securitization to reduce funding costs.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio