The Journal of Finance publishes leading research across all the major fields of finance. It is one of the most widely cited journals in academic finance, and in all of economics. Each of the six issues per year reaches over 8,000 academics, finance professionals, libraries, and government and financial institutions around the world. The journal is the official publication of The American Finance Association, the premier academic organization devoted to the study and promotion of knowledge about financial economics.
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The Optimal Concentration of Creditors
Published: 09/16/2005 | DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-6261.2005.00796.x
ARTURO BRIS, IVO WELCH
Our model assumes that creditors need to expend resources to collect on claims. Consequently, because diffuse creditors suffer from mutual free‐riding (Holmstrom (1982)), they fare worse than concentrated creditors (e.g., a house bank). The model predicts that measures of debt concentration relate positively to creditors' (aggregate) debt collection expenditures and positively to management's chosen expenditures to resist paying. However, collection activity is purely redistributive, so social waste is larger when creditors are concentrated. If borrower quality is not known, the best firms choose the most concentrated creditors and pay higher expected yields.
The Costs of Bankruptcy: Chapter 7 Liquidation versus Chapter 11 Reorganization
Published: 05/16/2006 | DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-6261.2006.00872.x
ARTURO BRIS, IVO WELCH, NING ZHU
Our paper explores a comprehensive sample of small and large corporate bankruptcies in Arizona and New York from 1995 to 2001. Bankruptcy costs are very heterogeneous and sensitive to the measurement method used. We find that Chapter 7 liquidations appear to be no faster or cheaper (in terms of direct expense) than Chapter 11 reorganizations. However, Chapter 11 seems to preserve assets better, thereby allowing creditors to recover relatively more. Our paper also provides a large number of further empirical regularities.
Efficiency and the Bear: Short Sales and Markets Around the World
Published: 05/08/2007 | DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-6261.2007.01230.x
ARTURO BRIS, WILLIAM N. GOETZMANN, NING ZHU
We analyze cross‐sectional and time‐series information from 46 equity markets around the world to consider whether short sales restrictions affect the efficiency of the market and the distributional characteristics of returns to individual stocks and market indices. We find some evidence that prices incorporate negative information faster in countries where short sales are allowed and practiced. A common conjecture by regulators is that short sales restrictions can reduce the relative severity of a market panic. We find strong evidence that in markets where short selling is either prohibited or not practiced, market returns display significantly less negative skewness.