Paper #1183

Título:

Betting on Hitler: The value of political connections in Nazi Germany

Autores:

Joachim Voth y Thomas Ferguson

Fecha:

Febrero 2008

Resumen:

This paper examines the value of connections between German industry and the Nazi movement in early 1933. Drawing on previously unused contemporary sources about management and supervisory board composition and stock returns, we find that one out of seven firms, and a large proportion of the biggest companies, had substantive links with the National Socialist German Workers� Party. Firms supporting the Nazi movement experienced unusually high returns, outperforming unconnected ones by 5% to 8% between January and March 1933. These results are not driven by sectoral composition and are robust to alternative estimators and definitions of affiliation.

Palabras clave:

Political Connections, Stock Market, Asset Pricing, Nazi Rise to Power, Interwar Germany

Códigos JEL:

G12, G13, G15, N24

Área de investigación:

História Económica y de la Empresa

Publicado en:

Quarterly Journal of Economics, February 2008, 123 (1), pp. 101-137

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