How Law Affects Lending

34 Pages Posted: 13 Nov 2005 Last revised: 2 Sep 2008

See all articles by Rainer F. H. Haselmann

Rainer F. H. Haselmann

Goethe University Frankfurt - Faculty of Economics and Business Administration; Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE

Katharina Pistor

Columbia University School of Law

Vikrant Vig

London Business School

Multiple version iconThere are 2 versions of this paper

Date Written: August 2008

Abstract

The paper explores how legal change affects lending behavior of banks in twelve transition economies of Central and Eastern Europe. In contrast to previous studies, we use bank level rather than aggregate data, which allows us to control for country level heterogeneity and analyze the effect of legal change on different types of lenders. Using a differences-in-differences methodology to analyze the within country variation of changes in creditor rights protection, we find that the credit supplied by banks increases subsequent to legal change. Further, we show that collateral law matters more for credit market development than bankruptcy law. We also show that entrants respond more strongly to legal change than incumbents. In particular, foreign-owned banks extend their lending volume substantially more than do domestic banks, be they private or state owned. The same holds when we use foreign greenfield banks as proxies for new entrants. These results are robust after controlling for a wide variety of possibilities.

Keywords: Law, Finance, Bankruptcy, Secured Lending, Banks

JEL Classification: F34, F37, G21, G28, G33, K39

Suggested Citation

Haselmann, Rainer F. H. and Pistor, Katharina and Vig, Vikrant, How Law Affects Lending (August 2008). Columbia Law and Economics Working Paper No. 285, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=846665 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.846665

Rainer F. H. Haselmann

Goethe University Frankfurt - Faculty of Economics and Business Administration ( email )

Mertonstrasse 17-25
Frankfurt am Main, D-60325
Germany

Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE ( email )

(http://www.safe-frankfurt.de)
Theodor-W.-Adorno-Platz 3
Frankfurt am Main, 60323
Germany

Katharina Pistor

Columbia University School of Law ( email )

435 West 116th Street
New York, NY 10025
United States
212-854-0068 (Phone)
212-854-7946 (Fax)

Vikrant Vig (Contact Author)

London Business School ( email )

Sussex Place
Regent's Park
London, London NW1 4SA
United Kingdom

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