Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Corporate Performance in the East Asian Financial Crisis

Contents:

Author Info

  • Claessens, Stijn
  • Djankov, Simeon
  • Xu, Lixin Colin

Abstract

The sharp decline in the once-stellar performance of East Asian corporations following the 1997 financial crisis has sparked an intense debate. Some observers argue that external shocks, including a drop in aggregate demand and a shortage of working capital, explain the corporate sector's poor performance. Others assert that the difficulties were apparent well before the crisis and that the risky financial policies pursued by these firms left them vulnerable. A survey of the literature shows little microeconomic evidence to support either view. This article compares the growth and financing patterns of East Asian corporations in the years before the crisis with those in other countries. It finds little microeconomic evidence that corporate growth was weakening but some support for the argument that many firms had a weak financial structure that left them vulnerable to an economic downturn. Based on a sample of more than 850 publicly listed firms in the four crisis countries--Indonesia, Malaysia, the Republic of Korea, and Thailand--and two comparators, Hong Kong (China) and Singapore, it appears that firm-specific weaknesses already in existence before the crisis were important factors in the deteriorating performance of the corporate sector. Copyright 2000 by Oxford University Press.

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://www.worldbank.org/research/journals/wbro/obsfeb00/Article_2.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Bibliographic Info

Article provided by World Bank Group in its journal World Bank Research Observer.

Volume (Year): 15 (2000)
Issue (Month): 1 (February)
Pages: 23-46

as in new window
Handle: RePEc:oup:wbrobs:v:15:y:2000:i:1:p:23-46

Contact details of provider:
Postal: Oxford University Press, Great Clarendon Street, Oxford OX2 6DP, UK
Phone: (202) 477-1234
Fax: 01865 267 985
Email:
Web page: http://wbro.oxfordjournals.org/
More information through EDIRC

Order Information:
Web: http://www.oup.co.uk/journals

Related research

Keywords:

References

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
as in new window
  1. Kaufmann, Daniel & Kraay, Aart & Zoido-Lobaton, Pablo, 1999. "Governance matters," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2196, The World Bank.
  2. Agenor, Pierre-Richard & Aizenman, Joshua, 1999. "Financial sector inefficiencies and coordination failures : implications for crisis management," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2185, The World Bank.
  3. Zhaohui Chen & Jorge A. Chan-Lau, 1998. "Financial Crisis and Credit Crunch as a Result of Inefficient Financial Intermediation - with Reference to the Asian Financial Crisis," IMF Working Papers 98/127, International Monetary Fund.
  4. Laeven, Luc, 1999. "Risk and efficiency in East Asian banks," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2255, The World Bank.
  5. Atish R. Ghosh & Swart R. Ghosh, 1999. "East Asia in the Aftermath - Was There a Crunch?," IMF Working Papers 99/38, International Monetary Fund.
  6. Graciela L. Kaminsky & Carmen M. Reinhart, 1996. "The twin crises: the causes of banking and balance-of-payments problems," International Finance Discussion Papers 544, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
  7. Cho, Y.J. & Kim, J.K., 1995. "Credit Policies and the Industrialization of Korea," World Bank - Discussion Papers 286, World Bank.
  8. La Porta, Rafael & Lopez-de-Silanes, Florencio & Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert W., 1998. "Law and Finance," Scholarly Articles 3451310, Harvard University Department of Economics.
  9. Paul Krugman, 1999. "Balance Sheets, the Transfer Problem, and Financial Crises," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer, vol. 6(4), pages 459-472, November.
  10. Bernanke, Ben & Gertler, Mark, 1995. "Inside the Black Box: The Credit Channel of Monetary Policy Transmission," Working Papers 95-15, C.V. Starr Center for Applied Economics, New York University.
  11. Anil Kashyap & Jeremy C. Stein, 1993. "Monetary Policy and Bank Lending," NBER Working Papers 4317, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  12. Stiglitz, Joseph E & Weiss, Andrew, 1981. "Credit Rationing in Markets with Imperfect Information," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 71(3), pages 393-410, June.
  13. Rafael La Porta & Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes & Andrei Shleifer & Robert Vishny, 1999. "Investor Protection: Origins, Consequences, Reform," Harvard Institute of Economic Research Working Papers 1883, Harvard - Institute of Economic Research.
  14. Oliver Hart, 2000. "Different Approaches to Bankruptcy," Harvard Institute of Economic Research Working Papers 1903, Harvard - Institute of Economic Research.
  15. Claessens, Stijn & Djankov, Simeon & Klapper, Leora, 1999. "Resolution of corporate distress - evidence from East Asia's financial crisis," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2133, The World Bank.
  16. Jason Furman & Joseph E. Stiglitz, 1998. "Economic Crises: Evidence and Insights from East Asia," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 29(2), pages 1-136.
  17. Claessens, S. & Djankov, S. & Lang, L.H.P., 1999. "East Asian Corporations. Heroes or Villains?," World Bank - Discussion Papers 409, World Bank.
  18. Steven Radelet & Jeffrey D. Sachs, 1998. "The East Asian Financial Crisis: Diagnosis, Remedies, Prospects," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 29(1), pages 1-90.
  19. Asli Demirgüç-Kunt & Vojislav Maksimovic, 1998. "Law, Finance, and Firm Growth," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 53(6), pages 2107-2137, December.
Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

Citations

Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
as in new window

Cited by:
This item has more than 25 citations. To prevent cluttering this page, these citations are listed on a separate page.

Lists

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:oup:wbrobs:v:15:y:2000:i:1:p:23-46

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Oxford University Press) or (Christopher F. Baum).

If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

If references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link to it, you can help with this form.

If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.