NEWSLETTER of April 8, 2022

The following content has been added at finexpert:

BCG | INSEAD
THE BCG-INSEAD BOARD ESG PULSE CHECK
Board members at companies across geographies and industries understand that competitive advantage increasingly demands sustainability. And that is rapidly pushing environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues higher on board agendas. >more

KfW Research
CORONA-BETROFFENHEIT IM MITTELSTAND NIMMT WIEDER ZU: PERSONALAUSFÄLLE HÄUFEN SICH, ABER FINANZIELLE LAGE INTAKT
The effects of the Omicron wave are becoming visible in the SME sector: In March 2022, the Corona exposure of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is on the rise again. The recovery comes to a halt (for now). Industrial SMEs and construction companies in particular are currently struggling heavily with the pandemic effects. >more

Bain & Company
HEALTHCARE PRIVATE EQUITY MARKET 2021: THE YEAR IN REVIEW
In the second year of Covid-19, healthcare private equity activity showed remarkable resilience to the widespread disruption, posting a record year for both deal volume and disclosed value. This stemmed partly from a pandemic-induced backlog of parked deals, as well as the revival of megadeals headlined by the $34 billion Medline deal and the $17 billion acquisition of Athenahealth. >more

Invest Europe
PRIVATE EQUITY AT WORK 2022
Detailed evidence and analysis of the European private equity and venture capital industry’s real contribution to employment, in 2020, and job creation, in 2019-20, and the far-reaching impact this has on the people, societies and economies of Europe. >more
 

J.P. Morgan
GUIDE TO THE MARKETS EUROPE: Q2 2022
Updated each quarter, the Guide to the Markets illustrates a comprehensive array of market and economic trends and statistics for Europe. This includes information about equities, fixed income and other asset classes as well as macroeconomic analyses. >more

THE EU TAXONOMY AND THE SYNDICATED LOAN MARKET
Zacharias Sautner, Jing Yu, Rui Zhong, and Xiaoyan Zhou
2022
We provide first empirical evidence on the financial market effects of the EU Taxonomy for Sustainable Activities. Using international data from the syndicated loan market, we demonstrate that – in the past – firms with larger Taxonomy-aligned revenue shares paid lower interest rates. Business revenue is Taxonomy-aligned if it originates from “transitional activities” that substantially contribute to climate change mitigation. A one-standard-deviation increase in firm revenue from transitional activities is associated with six basis points lower loan spreads. Effects are more pronounced for firms in countries with greater climate risk exposure and more stringent environmental policies, and when lending institutions have green preferences. Our results indicate that financial markets already price in some of the intended effects of the EU Taxonomy. >more

VALUE PREMIUM, NETWORK ADOPTION, AND FACTOR PRICING OF CRYPTO ASSETS
Lin William Cong, George Andrew Karolyi, Ke Tang, and Weiyi Zhao
2022
We document characteristics-based return anomalies in a large cross-section of crypto assets. Cryptocurrency returns exhibit momentum in the largest-cap group, reversals in other size groups, and strong crypto value and network adoption premia, from which we derive two novel factors to add to the cryptocurrency version of market, size, and momentum factors. The resulting C-5 model outperforms extant models in pricing the cross-section of crypto assets. We also provide the first comprehensive classification of all major cryptocurrencies based on their economic functionality. We then adopt methodologies from international finance to demonstrate significant market segmentation across token categories, underscoring the importance for considering token categories in investment and regulatory policymaking. >more