Working Papers
Abstract: Underwriting policies have become an increasingly important tool through which insurers manage reputational risks. We study the design, determinants, implementation, and real effects of such policies in the context of coal projects. Coal underwriting policies are more common among insurers from countries with stronger climate policies and less common among specialty and unlisted insurers. Policy-adopting insurers reduce coverage of U.S. coal mines, but implementation is incomplete and heterogeneous. Other insurers replace withdrawn coverage only partly. Because insurance is legally required to operate, affected mines become more likely to be abandoned. An insurance-supply model rationalizes these patterns.
Presentations: BIS-CEPR-Gerzensee-SFI Conference on Financial Intermediation (2026), SGF Conference (2026), Baruch Climate Conference (2026), NBER Climate Finance (2025), Exeter Sustainable Finance Conference (2025), SFI Research Days (2025)
Seminars: QFinLab Seminar at Politecnico di Milano (2025), University of Zurich PhD Seminar (2025), St. Gallen Financial Economics Seminar (2025)*
Coverage: UZH Initiative in Sustainable Finance, Insurance Post, Insurance Asia, Mining Magazine, Insure Our Future, Simon Oh's Better Know a Paper Podcast
*Presentation by co-author
(with Emanuela Benincasa, Miguel Ferreira, and Emilia Garcia-Appendini)
R&R at the Review of Financial Studies
Abstract: We show that uncoordinated climate policies, which expose firms to heterogeneous climate transition risk, induce supply-chain reconfiguration. Following the introduction of California’s cap-and-trade program, relationships involving regulated suppliers are more likely to terminate than otherwise comparable relationships with unregulated suppliers. Regulated suppliers experience operational disruptions, consistent with customers reallocating sourcing to reduce uncertainty about supplier reliability. These effects are concentrated among suppliers in competitive industries and producers of standardized inputs, where customer switching costs are low. The resulting reconfiguration is consistent with carbon leakage: customers that reallocate away from regulated suppliers shift toward supply chains with a higher carbon footprint.
Presentations (including scheduled ones): SFS Cavalcade NA (2026), EFA (2025)*, AFA Ph.D. Poster Session (2025), NYU Stern Summer Climate Finance Conference Poster Session (2025)*, GRASFI (2025), CREDIT Conference (2025), ESCP Sustainable Finance Workshop (2025), HEC-HKUST sustainable finance workshop (2024)*, 5th University of Oklahoma and Review of Financial Studies Climate and Energy Finance Research Conference (2024), ESADE, ECB, EBRD, EBA, CEPR, CompNet & IWH Conference on Finance and Productivity (FINPRO 2024), Banca d’Italia-EABCN-EUI-CEPR Joint Conference on The Macroeconomic and Financial Dimensions of the Green Transition (2024), Rising Scholars Conference on Sustainable Finance (2024), SFI Research Days (2024)
Seminars: Central Bank of Ireland Macro Finance Seminar Series (2025), University of Zurich (2024), CUNEF (2024)*, Norges Bank (2024)*, the University of Groningen (2024)*
Coverage: VoxEU
Grant: SNSF Grant Nr. 100018 204561 / 1 (Project Corporate Short-Termism)
*Presentation by co-author
Pre-Ph.D. Paper
(with Margherita Giuzio, Sujit Kapadia, Dilyara Salakhova, and Katia Vozian)