French Firms and COVID-19: Do the Debt Status, Crisis Management System, and Monetary Policy Play a Role?

Abstract This study has two main objectives: first, it assesses the effect of outbreak pandemic diseases on the French firms’ stock returns by considering the sector of activity as the main center of analysis. Second, it investigates the role of the crisis management system, firm debt strategy, and monetary policy in dealing with the adverse shocks of the major outbreak of the COVID-19. The study results can be summarized as follows: (1) the daily growth in COVID-19 cases and deaths are associated with lower stock returns of the listed firms, especially for the firms operating in the energy, industrial and health care sectors. In contrast, telecommunication and consumer sectors are not significantly affected. (2) The pandemic’s adverse effect is much more tolerant with the French firms with an efficient crisis management system and low long-term debt commitments than the firms that do not have such a system and engaged with long term debts. (3) Euribor rates and monetary policy are still playing an essential role during the pandemic period.