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The Impact Of Financing Constraints On Markups: Theory And Evidence From Italian Firm Level Data

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Abstract

In this paper we look at both the theoretical and empirical behavior of price-cost margins when capital market imperfections affect firms’ markup policies. We present a model of a firm operating in an industry with differentiated products and facing imperfect markets for financing operations. The model results in an Euler equation for the optimal price path which is estimated using data for several hundreds Italian firms over the period 1981-1993. The empirical results suggest that: (i) capital market imperfections are present in the sense that firms in our sample pay a premium on external finance which significantly depends on the debt to sales ratio; (ii) according to our estimates constrained firms find it optimal to cut price compared to unconstrained firms; (iii) as firms are more likely to be financially constrained in recessions, our results imply that financial market imperfections tend to make markups procyclical.

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  • Anna Bottasso & Marzio Galeotti & Alessandro Sembenelli, 1997. "The Impact Of Financing Constraints On Markups: Theory And Evidence From Italian Firm Level Data," CERIS Working Paper 199706, CNR-IRCrES Research Institute on Sustainable Economic Growth - Torino (TO) ITALY - former Institute for Economic Research on Firms and Growth - Moncalieri (TO) ITALY.
    • Handle: RePEc:csc:cerisp:199706
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    Cited by:

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    2. Jean-Bernard Chatelain, 1999. "Taux de marge et structure financière," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 53, pages 127-147.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Markup; Financing Constraints; Differentiated Products;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D21 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Firm Behavior: Theory
    • D43 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Oligopoly and Other Forms of Market Imperfection
    • D92 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Intertemporal Firm Choice, Investment, Capacity, and Financing
    • E30 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)

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