Currency crises can arise because it is optimal to bail out financially distressed exporting firms through a currency depreciation. Exporting firms will not undertake profitable investments when high leverage causes debt overhang problems. A currency depreciation increases the profitability of new investments when revenues are foreign-currency denominated and domestic-currency costs are nominally rigid. Ex ante, currency depreciation leads to excessive investment in risky projects even if safer, more valuable projects are available. However, currency depreciation is optimal ex ante if the risky projects have higher expected returns and if firms must rely on debt financing because of underdeveloped equity markets.

We study the financing policies of European public corporations prior to the euro crisis. Using data from 11 euro countries and a control group of five other European countries over 1991–2006, we show that nonfinancial firms from euro countries with previously weak currencies considerably increased their debt financing after the introduction of the euro. The results are stronger for large firms, firms dependent on external financing, and for the latter part of the post-euro time period. Overall, the results support the hypothesis that the supply of capital increased following the introduction of the euro.