Real effects of financial distress: the role of heterogeneity

Francisco Buera and Sudipto Karmakar

No 814, Bank of England working papers from Bank of England

Abstract: What are the heterogeneous effects of financial shocks on firms’ behavior? This paper evaluates and answers this question from both an empirical and a theoretical perspective. Using micro data from Portugal during the sovereign debt crisis, starting in 2010, we document that highly leveraged firms and firms that had a larger share of short-term debt on their balance sheets contracted more in the aftermath of a financial shock. We use a standard model to analyse the conditions under which leverage and debt maturity determine the sensitivity of firms’ investment decisions to financial shocks. We show that the presence of long-term investment projects and frictions to the issuance of long-term debt are needed for the model to rationalize the empirical findings. We conclude that the differential responses of firms to a financial shock do not provide unambiguous information to identify these shocks. Rather, we argue that this information should be used to test for the relevance of important model assumptions.

Keywords: Sovereign debt; leverage; maturity structure; spillovers (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E44 F34 G12 H63 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 70 pages
Date: 2019-08-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-mac
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Real Effects of Financial Distress: The Role of Heterogeneity (2022)
Working Paper: Real Effects of Financial Distress: The Role of Heterogeneity (2018)
Working Paper: Real Effects of Financial Distress: The Role of Heterogeneity (2018)
Working Paper: Real Effects of Financial Distress: The Role of Heterogeneity (2017)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:boe:boeewp:0814

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