The reallocation effects of COVID-19: Evidence from venture capital investments around the world.

We examine possible reallocation effects generated by the COVID-19 outbreak by analyzing the patterns of venture capital (VC) investments around the globe. Using transaction-level data and exploiting the staggered nature of the spread of the virus, we document a shift in VC portfolios towards firms developing technologies relevant to an environment of social distancing and health pandemic concerns. A difference-in-differences analysis estimates significant increases in invested amount and number of deals in such areas.

Political alignment, centralisation, and the sense of government unpreparedness during the COVID-19 pandemic.

We rely on a periodic public opinion poll indicator of the performance of mayors collected for 103 large cities in Italy and in three waves (2015, 2017, and 2020) to examine whether and to what extent the exogenous shift in policy-making decisions induced by the COVID-19 pandemic has affected citizens' perceptions regarding attributions of responsibility. We leverage the variation in political alignment between central and local governments and implement a difference-in-differences research design, finding that when decisions are fully centralised (during the lockdown), voter approval for the mayor of an aligned city decreases by around 7%. Further analyses suggest that our results are more marked (i) during pre-electoral years and (ii) in cities with a lower level of social capital.

Who chokes on a penalty kick? Social environment and individual performance during Covid-19 times.

We use hand-collected data on penalty kicks in the top-level football competitions across France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the United Kingdom over the 2019/2020 season to analyse how social environment affects the performance of individuals. We exploit the Covid-19 outbreak to induce a plausible source of variation in the supporters' attendance. We find that for home teams the probability of missing a penalty increases when matches are forced to be played behind closed doors, while visiting teams are less likely to choke on a penalty kick, with these effects being more pronounced when the level of attendance (measured before the pandemic) was high.