Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(774)
- Faculty Publications (272)
- October 2002 (Revised March 2009)
- Background Note
Foreign Direct Investment
By: Laura Alfaro and Esteban Clavell
Briefly reviews motivations and trends behind foreign direct investment and multinational corporations as well as the policy debate that surrounds them. View Details
- October 2002
- Teaching Note
Malaysia: Capital and Control (TN)
By: Rawi E. Abdelal and Laura Alfaro
Teaching Note for (9-702-040). View Details
Keywords: Malaysia
- Article
On the Political Economy of Temporary Stabilization Programs
By: Laura Alfaro
This paper provides a political economy explanation for temporary exchange-rate-based stabilization programs by focusing on the distributional effects of real exchange-rate appreciation. I propose an economy in which agents are endowed with either tradable or... View Details
- May 2002
- Teaching Note
Brazil: Embracing Globalization? TN
By: Laura Alfaro
Teaching Note for (9-701-104). View Details
Keywords: Brazil
- April 2002 (Revised April 2003)
- Case
Malaysia: Capital and Control
By: Rawi E. Abdelal and Laura Alfaro
On September 1, 1998, the government of Malaysia imposed currency and capital controls in response to the financial crisis that had swept Asia. The controls sparked an enormous controversy in the world of international finance. Some celebrated the controls for... View Details
- April 2002 (Revised September 2002)
- Background Note
Capital Controls
By: Rawi E. Abdelal and Laura Alfaro
Only in the waning years of the 20th century did international financial markets begin to enjoy the freedom from government regulation that they had experienced before the first world war. By 2002, international capital markets had grown to be enormous--$1.2 trillion... View Details
- 2001
- Working Paper
The 1999-2000 Euro-Depreciation: A Quantitative Approach
By: Laura Alfaro and Lluis Lluis Parera-i-Ximenez
- April 2001 (Revised May 2002)
- Case
Brazil: Embracing Globalization?
By: Laura Alfaro
In 2001, Brazil stands at a crossroads. The country seems to be emerging from decades of economic stagnation. The economic situation remains tenuous, however, Brazil's leaders must now chart a forward course. Most critically, they must decide whether Brazil's future... View Details
- March 2001 (Revised February 2004)
- Case
Power to the States: "Fiscal Wars" for FDI in Brazil
By: Laura Alfaro, Yasheng Huang and Marios S. Kalochoritis
On January 6, 1999, Itamar Franco, the governor of the state of Minas Gerais, the second-largest state in Brazil, declared a 90-day moratorium on its debt payment to the federal government. The announcement triggered a run on the Brazilian currency, the Real, and... View Details
- November 1999
- Article
Why Governments Implement Temporary Stabilization Programs
By: Laura Alfaro
Keywords: Government and Politics
- March 1998 (Revised April 1998)
- Case
Lehigh Steel
By: V.G. Narayanan and Laura Donohue
Lehigh Steel is a specialty steel manufacturer that plummeted from record profits to record losses in less than three years, driven by an inability to distinguish between profitable and unprofitable business. The scale and growth of service activities and overhead... View Details
- Research Summary
Capital Controls, Risk and Liberalization Cycles (joint with Fabio Kanczuk)
By: Laura Alfaro
We construct an Overlapping-Generations model where agents vote on whether to open or close the economy to international capital flows. Political decisions are shaped by the risk over capital and labor returns. In an open economy, the capitalists (old) completely hedge... View Details
- Research Summary
Capital Flows and Capital Goods (joint with Eliza Hammel)
By: Laura Alfaro
We examine one of the channels through which financial integration can help promote growth. In particular, we study the effects of capital account liberalization on the imports of capital goods. We pay particular attention to the effects of equity market... View Details
- Research Summary
Capital flows in a Globalized Economy: The Role of Policies and Institutions (joint with Sebnem Kalemli-Ozcan and Vadym Volosovych)
By: Laura Alfaro
We describe the patterns of international capital flows in the period 1970-2000. We then examine the determinants of capital flows and capital flow volatility during this period. We find that institutional quality is an important determinant of capital flows.... View Details
- Research Summary
Come Together: Firm Boundaries and Delegation
By: Laura Alfaro
We develop an incomplete-contracts model to jointly study firm boundaries and the allocation of decision rights within them. Integration has an option value: it gives firm owners authority to delegate or centralize decision rights, depending on who can best solve... View Details
- Research Summary
Corporate Debt, Firm Size and Financial Fragility in Emerging Markets
By: Laura Alfaro
The post-Global Financial Crisis period shows a surge in corporate leverage in emerging markets and a number of countries with deteriorated corporate financial fragility indicators (Altman’s Z-score). Firm size plays a critical role in the relationship between... View Details
- Research Summary
Credit Supply Shocks, Network Effects, and the Real Economy
By: Laura Alfaro
We consider the real effects of bank lending shocks and how they permeate the economy through buyer-supplier linkages. We combine administrative data on all firms in Spain with a matched bank-firm-loan dataset with information on the universe of corporate loans for... View Details