We exploit a setting where lawyers are selected before the assignment of a judge and find that large Chapter 11 bankruptcy filings resolve 17%--25% faster when at least one lead counsel lawyer for the debtor has a connection to the judge. The most effective connections arise through previous in-court interactions. Connected cases are more likely to emerge ... Read More

The terms under which firms borrow can be revealing about what they think of their future prospects, according to investigations by Vidhan Goyal and Wei Wang, who looked at instances when firms chose short- or long-term debt maturity and the likelihood that this was guided by their privately-held information. “Firms with favorable private information ... Read More

How do differences in laws and their enforcement affect the amounts bank lend to firms, the maturity of the loans they make, and the interest rates they charge? In a recent paper, Vidhan K. Goyal of HKUST and his co-author Kee-Hong Bae examine the extent to which creditor rights and contract enforceability affect what loans are offered to firms, how the ... Read More