NEWSLETTER of February 12, 2021

The following content has been added at finexpert:

EY
CAPITAL CONFIDENCE BAROMETER: AUSWIRKUNGEN DER COVID-19 PANDEMIE
The majority of large German companies expect to recover quickly from the Corona crisis: more than half (56 percent) expect sales to reach the level seen before the outbreak of the pandemic before the end of the current year. At least a quarter (24 percent) expect the recovery to occur by 2022 at the latest. German companies believe that profitability will return somewhat more slowly: For the current year, 24 percent expect a return to the situation before the outbreak of the pandemic. >more

BCG
GLOBAL RETAIL BANKING 2021: THE FRONT-TO-BACK DIGITAL RETAIL BANK
Retail banks around the world reacted to the COVID-19 crisis with speed, dexterity, and purpose, while remaining true to their environmental, social, and corporate governance goals. Now, as the new reality starts to take shape, banks face further challenges. The pandemic shock has accelerated changes already underway and sparked new ones. Institutions’ revenues are under pressure, and global banking revenue pools have already taken a significant beating. Even under the most optimistic scenario, those pools are not expected to return to precrisis levels until 2022. >more

Lazard
ANNUAL REVIEW OF SHAREHOLDER ACTIVISM – 2020
Global activity saw a strong snap back in Q4, with 57 new campaigns launched (up 128% from Q3 level). As a result, 2020’s final global campaign tally (182 new campaigns launched) was down only 13% from 2019. The Q4 rebound was most pronounced in the U.S., where 30 new campaigns represented a 200% increase from Q3 levels. Non-U.S. activity saw an uptick for the year, with European and APAC campaign levels up 21% and 11%, respectively, over 2019 levels. >more

PwC
TRANSPORT & LOGISTICS BAROMETER
The COVID 19 pandemic left deep scars on the global transport and logistics industry in 2020. In view of the enormous challenges, some subsectors such as the freight segment nevertheless proved robust. For example, the momentum in mergers and acquisitions picked up significantly in the last two quarters of the past year after a weak first half. >more

BNP Paribas
TOKENISATION OF ALTERNATIVE INVESTMENTS
Technology offers fascinating perspectives for asset management. These include tokenisation, the process of creating a digital representation of non-digital assets on a blockchain. In a new white paper, we explore the potential application of tokenisation to enable fractional ownership by investors of alternative asset classes. >more

THE RISK OF BEING A FALLEN ANGEL AND THE CORPORATE DASH FOR CASH IN THE MIDST OF COVID
Viral V. Acharya, and Sascha Steffen
2020
Data on firm-loan-level daily credit line drawdowns in the United States reveals a corporate “dash for cash” induced by COVID-19. In the first phase of extreme precaution and heightened aggregate risk, all firms drew down bank credit lines and raised cash levels. In the second phase following the adoption of stabilization policies, only the highest-rated firms switched to capital markets to raise cash. Consistent with the risk of becoming a fallen angel, the lowest-quality BBB-rated firms behaved more similarly to non-investment grade firms. The observed corporate behavior reveals the significant impact of credit risk on corporate cash holdings. >more

CAPITAL FLOWS, REAL ESTATE, AND LOCAL CYCLES: EVIDENCE FROM GERMAN CITIES, BANKS, AND FIRMS
Peter Bednarek, Daniel te Kaat, Chang Ma, and Alessandro Rebucci
2019
We study how a capital flow shock impacts German cities’ GDP growth depending on the state of their local real estate markets. Identification exploits a policy framework assigning refugees to cities on a quasi-random basis and variation in non-developable area for the construction of a measure of exposure to local real estate market tightness. We estimate that the German cities most exposed to real estate market tightness grew at least 1.9 percentage points more than the least exposed ones, cumulatively, during the 2009-2014 period. Capital inflows shift credit to firms with more collateral. More collateral also leads firms to hire and invest more in response to these shocks. >more