COVID-19

Financial conditions and zombie companies: International evidence

Crawford School of Public Policy
Photo by Stephen Dawson on Unsplash

Event details

PhD Seminar (Econ)

Date & time

Friday 06 May 2022
11.00am–12.00pm

Venue

Weston Theatre , Crawford School of Public Policy, No 132, Lennox Crossing, The ANU

Speaker

Joel Bowman

Financial conditions eased after the global financial crisis and during the COVID-19 pandemic as policymakers across most countries adopted large scale monetary policy easing. This has increased concern amongst some that a prolonged period of accommodative financial conditions has fostered the growth of zombie companies - businesses that are consistently unable to meet their interest expenses from current profits. This paper finds that an easing in self-constructed measures of financial conditions is correlated with an increase in the share of resources sunk into zombie companies using a sample of listed companies across 20 OECD countries and 11 industries over the period 2003 to 2019. However, the size of this relationship is higher for countries with banking systems that are in poorer financial health. As a result, fears that accommodative financial conditions foster more capital being sunk into inefficient zombie companies is likely to be less of a concern for countries with healthy banking systems.

Updated:  18 July 2024/Responsible Officer:  Crawford Engagement/Page Contact:  CAP Web Team