Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-s2hrs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T14:48:48.906Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

FINANCIAL FRAGILITY, INDUSTRIAL DYNAMICS, AND BUSINESS FLUCTUATIONS IN AN AGENT-BASED MODEL

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 July 2007

DOMENICO DELLI GATTI
Affiliation:
ITEMQ, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore
CORRADO DI GUILMI
Affiliation:
DEA, Università Politecnica delle Marche
MAURO GALLEGATI
Affiliation:
DEA, Università Politecnica delle Marche
GIANFRANCO GIULIONI
Affiliation:
DMQTE, Università “G. d'Annunzio” di Chieti-Pescara

Abstract

In this paper we present and discuss a simple financial accelerator agent-based model, whose conceptual core is the interaction of heterogeneous firms and the banking system. Its simplicity notwithstanding, the model is able to replicate through simulations a large number of stylized facts concerning the shape and evolution over time of the distribution of firms' sizes, growth rates, profits, and “bad debt.”

Type
ARTICLES
Copyright
© 2007 Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Axtell R. 2001 Zipf distribution of US firm sizes. Science 293, 18181820.Google Scholar
Bak P. 1997 How Nature Works. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Bak P., K. Chen, J. Scheinkman, and M. Woodford 1993 Aggregate fluctuations from independent sectoral shocks: Self-organized criticality in a model of production and inventory dynamics. Ricerche Economiche 47, 330.Google Scholar
Bernanke B. and M. Gertler 1989 Agency costs, net worth and business fluctuations. American Economic Review 79, 1431.Google Scholar
Bernanke B. and M. Gertler 1990 Financial fragility and economic performance. Quarterly Journal of Economics 105, 87144.Google Scholar
Bernanke B. and M. Gertler 1995 Inside the black box: The credit channel of monetary policy transmission. Journal of Economic Perspectives 9 (4), 2748.Google Scholar
Bernanke B., M. Gertler, and M. Gilchrist 1996 The financial accelerator and the flight to quality. Review of Economics and Statistics 78 (1), 115.Google Scholar
Bernanke B., M. Gertler, and M. Gilchrist 1999 The financial accelerator in a quantitative business cycle framework. In J. Taylor and M. Woodford (eds.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, pp. 13411393. Amsterdam: North Holland.
Canning D., L. Amaral, Y.M.M. Lee, and E. Stanley 1998 Scaling the volatility of GDP growth rates. Economics Letters 60, 335341.Google Scholar
Cooley T. and V. Quadrini 2001 Financial markets and firm dynamics. American Economic Review 91 (5), 12861310.Google Scholar
Delli Gatti D., C. Di Guilmi, E. Gaffeo, and M. Gallegati 2004 Bankruptcy as an exit mechanism for systems with a variable number of components. Physica A 344, 813.Google Scholar
Delli Gatti D., C. Di Guilmi, E. Gaffeo, M. Gallegati, G. Giulioni, and A. Palestrini 2005 A new approach to business fluctuations: Heterogeneous interacting agents, scaling laws and financial fragility. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 56, 489512.Google Scholar
Delli Gatti D., M. Gallegati, G. Giulioni, and A. Palestrini 2003 Financial fragility, patterns of firms' entry and exit and aggregate dynamics. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 51, 7997.Google Scholar
Di Guilmi A., E. Gaffeo, and M. Gallegati 2004 Empirical results on the size distribution of business cycle phases. Physica A 333, 325334.Google Scholar
Estrella A., S. Park, and S. Peristiani 2000 Capital ratios as predictors of bank failure. FRBNY Economic Policy Review 6 (2), July.Google Scholar
Fujiwara Y. 2003 Data analysis of Japanese bankruptcy. Mimeo, ATR (Advanced Telecommunication Research Institute International), Kyoto, Japan.
Fujiwara Y., C. Di Guilmi, H. Aoyama, M. Gallegati, and W. Souma 2004 Do Pareto–Zipf and Gibrat's laws hold true? An analysis with European firms. Physica A 335, 197216.Google Scholar
Gabaix X. 2002 Power laws and the origins of the business cycle. Technical report 484, Econometric Society.
Gaffeo E., M. Gallegati, and A. Palestrini 2003 On the size distribution of firms: Additional evidence from the G7 countries. Physica A 324, 117123.Google Scholar
Gallegati M., G. Giulioni, and N. Kichiji 2003 Complex dynamics and financial fragility in an agent-based model. Advances in Complex Systems 6, 267282.Google Scholar
Greenwald B. and J. Stiglitz 1988 Imperfect information, finance constraints and business fluctuations. In M. Kohn and S. Tsiang (eds.), Finance Constraints, Expectations and Macroeconomics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Greenwald B. and J. Stiglitz 1990 Macroeconomic models with equity and credit rationing. In R. Hubbard (ed.), Financial Markets and Financial Crises. Chicago: Chicago University Press.
Greenwald B. and J. Stiglitz 1993 Financial market imperfections and business cycles. Quarterly Journal of Economics 108, 77114.Google Scholar
Greenwald B., J. Stiglitz, and A. Weiss 1984 Informational imperfections in the capital market and macroeconomic fluctuations. American Economic Review 74 (2) 194199.Google Scholar
Hartley R.I. 1997 The Representative Agent in Macroeconomics. London: Routledge.
Hopenhayn H. 1992 Entry, exit and firm dynamics in long-run equilibrium. Econometrica 60, 11271150.Google Scholar
Kiyotaki N. and G. Moore 1997 Credit cycles. Journal of Political Economy 105, 211248.Google Scholar
Kiyotaki N. and G. Moore 2002 Balance-sheet contagion. American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 92, 4650.Google Scholar
Krugman P. 1996 The Self-Organizing Economy. Cambridge: Blackwell.
Laherrere and Sornette 1999 Stretched exponential distribution in nature and economy: Fat tails with characteristic scale. European Physical Journal B 2 (4), 525539.Google Scholar
Myers S.C. and N.S. Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have, Journal of Financial Economics 13, 187221.Google Scholar
Pareto V. 1897 Course d'Economie Politique, Vol. 2. Paris: Pichou.
Stanley M., L. Amaral, S. Buldyrev, S. Havlin, H. Leschorn, P. Maas, M. Salinger, and E. Stanley 1996 Scaling behavior in the growth of companies. Nature 379, 804806.Google Scholar
Stiglitz J. and B. Greenwald 2003 Towards a New Paradigm in Monetary Economics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Stoker T. 1993 Empirical approaches to the problem of aggregation over individuals. Journal of Economic Literature 31, 18271874.Google Scholar
Winter S., Y. Kaniovski, and G. Dosi 1997 A Baseline Model of Industry Evolution. Interim Report 111-97-013. Luxemburg: IIASA.