Stock Market Development and Economic Growth: A Matter of Information Dynamics

Salvatore Capasso

CSEF Working Papers from Centre for Studies in Economics and Finance (CSEF), University of Naples, Italy

Abstract: The aim of this paper is to provide further insights into the linkages between stock market development and economic growth. When it is not possible to distinguish between investment projects with different rates of return, market valuation of those projects is an “average value” reflecting the expected return across all investment opportunities. Consequently, as in a typical lemon’s market, higher return projects are penalised since they attract lower than fair prices. This informational cost, or dilution cost, depends on the degree of informational asymmetry in the market, as well as on the type of financial contract issued by the firm to finance those projects – typically, equity or debt. On this basis, we interpret the development of stock market as the result of a change in the level of informational costs which decrease with capital accumulation and induce firms to switch from debt financing to a less costly equity financing.

Keywords: Credit Markets; Economic Growth; Information Asymmetries; Stock Markets (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O16 O40 G10 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-fdg, nep-fin and nep-fmk
Date: 2006-09-01
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Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sef:csefwp:166

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