IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/red/sed014/1190.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Financial Distress and Endogenous Uncertainty

Author

Listed:
  • Francois Gourio

    (FRB Chicago)

Abstract

What is the macroeconomic effect of having a substantial number of firms close to default? This paper studies financial distress costs in a model where customers, suppliers and workers suffer losses if their employer goes bankrupt. I show that this mechanism generates amplification of fundamental shocks through procyclical TFP and countercyclical labor wedge. Because the strength of this amplification depends on the share of firms that are in financial distress, it operates mostly in recessions, when equity values are low. This leads macroeconomic volatility to be endogenously countercyclical. The cross-sectional distribution of firms' equity values affects directly aggregate macroeconomic volatility. Empirical evidence consistent with the model is provided.

Suggested Citation

  • Francois Gourio, 2014. "Financial Distress and Endogenous Uncertainty," 2014 Meeting Papers 1190, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    • Handle: RePEc:red:sed014:1190
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.red-files-public.s3.amazonaws.com/meetpapers/2014/paper_1190.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bigelow, John & Cooper, Russell & Ross, Thomas W, 1993. "Warranties without Commitment to Market Participation," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 34(1), pages 85-100, February.
    2. Kyle Jurado & Sydney C. Ludvigson & Serena Ng, 2015. "Measuring Uncertainty," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(3), pages 1177-1216, March.
    3. Kollmann, Robert & Zeugner, Stefan, 2012. "Leverage as a predictor for real activity and volatility," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 36(8), pages 1267-1283.
    4. Chugh, Sanjay K., 2013. "Costly external finance and labor market dynamics," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 37(12), pages 2882-2912.
    5. Boissay, Frédéric, 2006. "Credit chains and the propagation of financial distress," Working Paper Series 573, European Central Bank.
    6. Gregor Andrade & Steven N. Kaplan, 1998. "How Costly is Financial (Not Economic) Distress? Evidence from Highly Leveraged Transactions that Became Distressed," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 53(5), pages 1443-1493, October.
    7. Chevalier, Judith A, 1995. "Capital Structure and Product-Market Competition: Empirical Evidence from the Supermarket Industry," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(3), pages 415-435, June.
    8. Ali Hortaçsu & Gregor Matvos & Chad Syverson & Sriram Venkataraman, 2013. "Indirect Costs of Financial Distress in Durable Goods Industries: The Case of Auto Manufacturers," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 26(5), pages 1248-1290.
    9. Opler, Tim C & Titman, Sheridan, 1994. "Financial Distress and Corporate Performance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 49(3), pages 1015-1040, July.
    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


    Cited by:

    1. Contessi, Silvio & De Pace, Pierangelo & Guidolin, Massimo, 2020. "Mildly explosive dynamics in U.S. fixed income markets," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 287(2), pages 712-724.
    2. Alexander W. Richter & Nathaniel A. Throckmorton, 2017. "A New Way to Quantify the Effect of Uncertainty," Working Papers 1705, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    3. Tyler Atkinson & Michael Plante & Alexander Richter & Nathaniel Throckmorton, 2022. "Complementarity and Macroeconomic Uncertainty," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 44, pages 225-243, April.
    4. Miescu, Mirela S., 2023. "Uncertainty shocks in emerging economies: A global to local approach for identification," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    5. van Wijnbergen, Sweder & Jakucionyte, Egle, 2017. "Debt Overhang, Exchange Rates and the Macroeconomics of Carry Trade," CEPR Discussion Papers 11788, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    6. Abakah, Emmanuel Joel Aikins & Caporale, Guglielmo Maria & Gil-Alana, Luis Alberiko, 2021. "Economic policy uncertainty: Persistence and cross-country linkages," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C).
    7. Petr Sedláček, 2020. "Creative Destruction and Uncertainty," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 18(4), pages 1814-1843.
    8. Marek Ignaszak & Petr Sedlacek, 2021. "Profitability, Productivity and Growth," Discussion Papers 2115, Centre for Macroeconomics (CFM).
    9. Hikaru Saijo & Cosmin Ilut, 2015. "Learning, Confidence, and Business Cycles," 2015 Meeting Papers 917, Society for Economic Dynamics.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Epaulard, Anne & Zapha, Chloé, 2022. "Bankruptcy costs and the design of preventive restructuring procedures," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 196(C), pages 229-250.
    2. Jennifer Brown & David A. Matsa, 2016. "Boarding a Sinking Ship? An Investigation of Job Applications to Distressed Firms," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 71(2), pages 507-550, April.
    3. Purnanandam, Amiyatosh, 2008. "Financial distress and corporate risk management: Theory and evidence," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(3), pages 706-739, March.
    4. Dou, Winston Wei & Taylor, Lucian A. & Wang, Wei & Wang, Wenyu, 2021. "Dissecting bankruptcy frictions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 142(3), pages 975-1000.
    5. Ine Paeleman & Nadja Guenster & Tom Vanacker & Ana Cristina O. Siqueira, 2024. "The Consequences of Financial Leverage: Certified B Corporations’ Advantages Compared to Common Commercial Firms," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 189(3), pages 507-523, January.
    6. Tania Babina, 2017. "Destructive Creation at Work: How Financial Distress Spurs Entrepreneurship," Working Papers 17-19, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    7. Nuri Yildirim, 2015. "Not Leverage but Change in Leverage Matters for Firms' Future Growth: Evidence from Turkey's Top 1000," International Economic Journal, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 29(3), pages 503-525, September.
    8. Zacharias Sautner & Vladimir Vladimirov, 2018. "Indirect Costs of Financial Distress and Bankruptcy Law: Evidence from Trade Credit and Sales [Bankruptcy codes and innovations]," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 22(5), pages 1667-1704.
    9. Kim, Sang-Joon & Bae, John & Oh, Hannah, 2019. "Financing strategically: The moderation effect of marketing activities on the bifurcated relationship between debt level and firm valuation of small and medium enterprises," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 663-681.
    10. Correia, Ricardo & Población, Javier, 2015. "A structural model with Explicit Distress," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 112-130.
    11. John R. Graham & Sonali Hazarika & Krishnamoorthy Narasimhan, 2011. "Financial Distress in the Great Depression," NBER Working Papers 17388, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Campos, Javier & Carrasco, Raquel & Requejo, Alejandro, 2003. "Legal form and risk exposure in Spanish firms," MPRA Paper 103405, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 2002.
    13. Sriram Venkataraman & Gregor Matvos & Chad Syverson & Business & Business & Ali Hortacsu, 2010. "Are Consumers Affected by Durable Goods Makers’ Financial Distress? The Case of Auto Manufacturers," 2010 Meeting Papers 836, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    14. Natasha Agarwal & Chris Milner & Alejandro Riaño, 2011. "Credit Constraints and FDI Spillovers in China," Discussion Papers 11/21, University of Nottingham, GEP.
    15. Lyandres, Evgeny & Zhdanov, Alexei, 2013. "Investment opportunities and bankruptcy prediction," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 439-476.
    16. Veronesi, Pietro & Zingales, Luigi, 2010. "Paulson's gift," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(3), pages 339-368, September.
    17. Haan, Marco A. & Toolsema, Linda A., 2008. "The strategic use of debt reconsidered," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 26(2), pages 616-624, March.
    18. Glover, Brent, 2016. "The expected cost of default," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 119(2), pages 284-299.
    19. Maclachlan, Iain C, 2007. "An empirical study of corporate bond pricing with unobserved capital structure dynamics," MPRA Paper 28416, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Ciliberto, Federico & Schenone, Carola, 2012. "Bankruptcy and product-market competition: Evidence from the airline industry," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 30(6), pages 564-577.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:red:sed014:1190. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    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 CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc 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 RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Christian Zimmermann (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sedddea.html .

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.