Did Smaller Firms Face Higher Costs of Credit During the Great Recession? A Vector Error Correction Analysis with Structural Breaks

This paper examines the challenges firms (and policymakers) encounter when confronted by a recession at the zero lower bound, when traditional monetary policy is ineffective in the face of deteriorated balance sheets and high costs of credit. Within the larger body of literature, this paper focuses on the cost of credit during a recession, which constrains smaller firms from borrowing and investing, thus magnifying the contraction. Extending and revising a model originally developed by Walker (2010) and estimated by Pandey and Ramirez (2012), this study uses a Vector Error Correction Model with structural breaks to analyze the effects of relevant economic and financial factors on the cost of credit intermediation for small and large firms. Specifically, it tests whether large firms have advantageous access to credit, especially during recessions. The findings suggest that during the Great Recession of 2007-09 the cost of credit rose for small firms while it decreased for large firms, ceteris paribus. From the results, the paper assesses alternative ways in which the central bank can respond to a recession facing the zero lower bound

Cluster-resolved dynamic scaling theory and universal corrections for transport on percolating systems

For percolating systems, we propose a universal exponent relation connecting the leading corrections to scaling of the cluster size distribution with the dynamic corrections to the asymptotic transport behaviour at criticality. Our derivation is based on a cluster-resolved scaling theory unifying the scaling of both the cluster size distribution and the dynamics of a random walker. We corroborate our theoretical approach by extensive simulations for a site percolating square lattice and numerically determine both the static and dynamic correction exponents.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figures, 1 tabl

Paleozoic Crown Lungfishes from Gondwana foreshadow the Early Triassic Recovery Fauna

Modern lungfishes are renowned for tolerance of extreme environmental variation, which is thought to contribute to their abundance during the recovery from the Permo-Triassic Mass Extinction (PTME). However, the Paleozoic origins of this clade and its biogeographic context remains unclear, with a 60 Ma ghost lineage at the base of the crown lungfish diversification spanning much of the Upper Carboniferous and the entirety of the Permian. This gap is particularly perplexing given the exceptional record of archaic lungfishes within this interval, particularly within paleoequatorial Euramerica, but also within eastern Europe. One possibility is that the assembly of the crown lungfish bauplan from known Carboniferous and Permian archaic lungfish groups occurred rapidly in the recovery from the PTME. However, an alternative explanation is that the crown lungfish bauplan evolved earlier in geographic regions outside the well-sampled Carboniferous and Permian basins of Euramerica, Russia, and South Africa. The sudden appearance of a diverse crown lungfish fauna in the earliest Triassic would then represent a biogeographic release in response to climate or diversity trends associated with the PTME. New lungfish faunas from outside these basins provide an opportunity to test these hypotheses. Here we report a diverse lungfish fauna from the Early Permian Pedra de Fogo Formation (Parnaíba Basin, northeastern Brazil) comprised of abundant lungfish toothplates and rarer associated or articulated skeletal remains. This fauna lacks archaic lungfish taxa (e.g. sagenodontids, ctenodontids, and conchopomatids) characteristic of contemporary localities in equatorial Euramerica. Instead, the Parnaíba fauna preserves a diverse assemblage of derived lungfishes, including a gnathorhizid and several crown lungfishes (ceratodontiforms). The gnathorhizid is represented by abundant toothplates and several partial skulls, and shows similarities to the North American gnathorhizid genera Persephonichthys and Gnathorhiza. The ceratodontiform, which is represented by toothplates as well as several partial skulls and skeletons, shows affinities with Triassic ptychoceratodontids and arganodontids, currently considered early members of the lepidosireniform stem group. Comparison with lungfish toothplate assemblages from the Paraná Basin of southern Brazil shows that the lungfish assemblage from the Parnaíba basin is also present in the Middle Permian of Brazil, likely representing a persistent biogeographic province in western Gondwana. We hypothesize that the lungfish crown group originated early in western Gondwana, but remained biogeographically restricted until the PTME eliminated incumbent competition in better-known biogeographical provinces.Fil: Pardo, Jason. University of Calgary; CanadáFil: Kammerer, Christian. Museum Fur Naturkunde; AlemaniaFil: Marsicano, Claudia Alicia. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Ciudad Universitaria. Instituto de Estudios Andinos "Don Pablo Groeber". Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Instituto de Estudios Andinos "Don Pablo Groeber"; ArgentinaFil: Angielczyk, Kenneth D.. Field Museum of National History; Estados UnidosFil: Fröbisch, Jörg. No especifíca;Fil: Smith, Roger M. H.. University of Cape Town; SudáfricaFil: Cisneros, Juan C.. Universidade Federal do Piaui; BrasilAnnual Meeting Society Vertebrate PaleontologyEstados UnidosSociety of Vertebrate Paleontolog

Effect of quantum confinement on exciton-phonon interactions

We investigate the homogeneous linewidth of localized type-I excitons in type-II GaAs/AlAs superlattices. These localizing centers represent the intermediate case between quasi-two-dimensional (Q2D) and quasi-zero-dimensional localizations. The temperature dependence of the homogeneous linewidth is obtained with high precision from micro-photoluminescence spectra. We confirm the reduced interaction of the excitons with their environment with decreasing dimensionality except for the coupling to LO-phonons. The low-temperature limit for the linewidth of these localized excitons is five times smaller than that of Q2D excitons. The coefficient of exciton-acoustic-phonon interaction is 5 ~ 6 times smaller than that of Q2D excitons. An enhancement of the average exciton-LO-phonon interaction by localization is found in our sample. But this interaction is very sensitive to the detailed structure of the localizing centers.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figure