M&As, investment and financing constraints

We use a panel data set of European firms to analyse the effects of domestic and international M&As on target firms' investment, growth and financial constraints. Combining propensity score matching with a difference-in-differences estimator, our results indicate that upon acquisition, target firms obtain better access to external finance, are characterized by higher levels of tangible and intangible assets, and display lower dependence of investments and cash savings to the availability of internal funds. We also provide evidence that these effects are concentrated among acquisitions during the 2007-2009 financial crisis, relatively small target firms, and domestic rather than foreign acquisitions.