Essays on banking and corporate finance in developing countries

Abstract

This dissertation consists of three essays that examine banking and corporate finance in developing countries. Specifically, it explores the theoretical and empirical implications of open capital markets, foreign bank entry, and the role of bond markets during banking crises. Chapter 1 analyzes the impact of opening capital markets using a theoretical model that incorporates both foreign and domestic lenders in the presence of asymmetric information. The model suggests that when foreign lenders are limited in their ability to obtain information about entrepreneurs, they may engage in cream-skimming by only targeting the largest, most profitable firms. This cream-skimming can induce a reallocation of credit that may either increase or decrease overall net output of the open economy. The consequences of this credit reallocation depend on the type of financial opening and the quality of domestic institutions. Chapter 2 examines the entry of foreign banks as a specific case of opening capital markets. I estimate the impact of entry using variation in the location of foreign banks established in India following a policy change in 1994. The estimates indicate that the 10 percent most profitable firms received larger bank loans, but that on average, firms were 7.6 percentage points less likely to have a loan after entry.

(cont.) The decline in loans was uncorrelated with firms' profitability and driven by a decrease among group-affiliated firms. The reallocation is consistent with the presence of asymmetric information, and similar estimates are obtained using the location of pre-existing foreign firms as an instrument for the location choice of new banks. Chapter 3, co-authored with Simon Johnson and Changyong Rhee, uses a quasi-natural experiment in Korea after the 1997-98 financial crises to assess bond markets in emerging economies. Evidence confirms that bond markets can develop quickly during a banking crisis and act as a 'spare tire' even when almost all previous private finance flowed through the banking system. However, access to bonds was feasible only for the largest firms, and there is no evidence that bond finance was better directed than bank finance. Firms with weaker pre-crisis corporate governance were no less likely to obtain bond financing.