Corporate Financing Provided by Markets in the United States and by Banks in the Euro Zone: What have we Learned from the Crisis?

In the United States, companies obtain financing mainly in financial markets, while companies in the euro zone are financed mainly by banks. How have these two models for financing the economy reacted to the crisis? The corporate financing costs increase more with market financing than with bank loans; the availability of corporate financing in 2009 was ensured better by the bond market than by bank loans. We must look also the efficiency of monetary policy depending on the financing model; if monetary policy acts mainly via asset prices, it is more efficient in the United States. The overall assessment is therefore ambiguous, and there is no model for financing the economy without ambiguity upper to the other one.