In this paper, we analyze “trusted-assistant loans,” which were loans issued (typically) by Shanxi Banks during the Qing period to finance newly appointed scholar-officials. Even though creditors lacked legal rights and, in fact, lacked every repayment enforcement mechanism advanced by economic contract theory, repayment rates on these loans were relatively high and they constituted a large and profitable portion of many banks’ loan portfolios. This paper develops a theory of “resource-based” debt contract enforcement that rationalizes repayment and tests the hypothesis of this theory using data from scholar-officials’ diaries and nineteenth century Chinese bank records.
Chinese and Indian multinationals are continuously expanding their operations in Europe and the United States through cross-border acquisitions (CBAs), with the aim of tapping into international knowledge located in target firms and innovative hubs. Amendolagine, Giuliani, Martinelli, and Rabellotti have looked into impacts that CBAs have on...
Trade tensions between China and the United States have played an important role in swinging global stock markets, but the effects are difficult to quantify. Using a comprehensive database constructed by Wisers, we develop a novel trade sentiment index (TSI) based on textual analysis that assesses the positive or negative tone of Chinese media coverage of the China-US trade situation and evaluates the TSI’s capacity to...
Despite reforms to the hukou household registration system and the very large rural-urban migration experienced in China, rural households are still experiencing a risk of losing their land allocation if they migrate. We argue that this risk leads to an inefficient rental market with low rents and is an impediment to migration, with consequent over-employment in agriculture and low productivity.
China's non-financial borrowing continued to expand though the government vowed to take deleveraging among its top five policy priorities in 2016. Current member of the People's Bank of China's Monetary Policy Committee, Prof. Yiping Huang of Peking University, and his co-author Yuyan Tan of Peking University argue that resolving Zombie firms is a key for China’s deleveraging. The rising share of Zombies firms in China after 2010 reduces the financial efficiency and brings in financial market risks. Dealing with the Zombie firms is now critical for sustaining China’s long-run economic growth and managing its financial stability.