TY  - JOUR
AU  - Mishkin,Frederic S.
TI  - Asymmetric Information and Financial Crises:  A Historical Perspective
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 3400
PY  - 1991
Y2  - August 1991
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w3400
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w3400.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Frederic S. Mishkin
Columbia University
Graduate School of Business
Uris Hall 817
3022 Broadway
New York, NY 10027
Tel: 212-854-3488
Fax: 212/662-8474
E-Mail: fsm3@columbia.edu
M1  - published as Frederic S. Mishkin. "Asymmetric Information and Financial Crises: A Historical Perspective," in R. Glenn Hubbard, editor, "Financial Markets and Financial Crises" University of Chicago Press (1991)

AB  - This paper examines the nature of financial crises from a historical perspective using the new and burgeoning literature on asymmetric information and financial structure. After describing how this literature helps to understand the nature of financial crises, the paper focuses on a historical examination of a series of financial crises in the United States, beginning with the panic of 1857 and ending with the stock market crash of October 19,1987. The asymmetric information approach explains the patterns in the data and many features of these crises which are otherwise hard to explain. It also suggests why financial crises have had such important consequences for the aggregate economy over the past one hundred and fifty years.
ER  -