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State Ownership and Corporate Leverage Around the World

Author

Listed:
  • Ralph de Haas

    (CEPR - Center for Economic Policy Research - CEPR)

  • Sergei Guriev

    (ECON - Département d'économie (Sciences Po) - Sciences Po - Sciences Po - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, CEPR - Center for Economic Policy Research - CEPR)

  • Alexander Stepanov

Abstract

Does state ownership hinder or help rms access credit? We use data on almost 4 million rms in 89 countries to study the relationship between state ownership and corporate leverage. Controlling for country-sector-year xed eects and conventional rm-level determinants of leverage, we show that state ownership is robustly and negatively related to corporate leverage. This relationship holds across most of the rm-size distributionwith the important exception of the largest companiesand is stronger in countries with weak political and legal institutions. A panel data analysis of privatized rms and a comparison of privatized with matched control rms yield similar qualitative and quantitative eects of state ownership on leverage.

Suggested Citation

  • Ralph de Haas & Sergei Guriev & Alexander Stepanov, 2022. "State Ownership and Corporate Leverage Around the World," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03878686, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:spmain:hal-03878686
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://hal-sciencespo.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-03878686
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    State ownership privatization corporate debt state banks; State ownership; privatization; corporate debt; state banks;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D22 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Firm Behavior: Empirical Analysis
    • F36 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - Financial Aspects of Economic Integration
    • G32 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Financing Policy; Financial Risk and Risk Management; Capital and Ownership Structure; Value of Firms; Goodwill
    • G38 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Government Policy and Regulation
    • H11 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government - - - Structure and Scope of Government
    • H81 - Public Economics - - Miscellaneous Issues - - - Governmental Loans; Loan Guarantees; Credits; Grants; Bailouts
    • L33 - Industrial Organization - - Nonprofit Organizations and Public Enterprise - - - Comparison of Public and Private Enterprise and Nonprofit Institutions; Privatization; Contracting Out

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