We investigate how differential exposures by German banks to the US real estate market during the recent financial crisis affect their corporate lending in Germany. Using unique bank-level exposure data, we distinguish between three different types of bank exposures, i.e. direct exposure to the...

We show that collateral plays an important role in the design of debt contracts, the provision of credit, and the incentives of lenders to monitor borrowers. Using a unique dataset from a large bank containing timely assessments of collateral values, in conjunction with a legal reform that...

A unique legal reform in 2004 in Sweden redistributed liquidation proceeds from banks holding floating liens to unsecured creditors. Using a country-wide panel of all registered firms, we document that the resulting reduction in collateral capacity contracts the amount and maturity of corporate...

Standalone ratings measure a bank's intrinsic financial strength but – unlike all-in ratings – do not incorporate potential sovereign or parent-bank support. On July 20, 2011, Fitch switched from a 9-point to a 21-point scale for their standalone ratings but did not alter their all-in...

This paper studies the causal effect of gender bias on access to bank credit. We extract an exogenous measure of gender bias from survey responses by descendants of US immigrants on questions about the role of women in society. We then use data on 6,000 small business firms from 17 countries and...

We study the effects of diversifying funding sources on the financing conditions for firms. We exploit a regulatory reform that took place in Italy in 2012, i.e. the introduction of ‘minibonds’, which opened a new market-based funding opportunity for unlisted firms. Using the Italian Credit...

Does the cost of credit insurance affect the availability of credit? To answer this question, we couple comprehensive bank-firm level CDS trading data from DTCC to the German credit register containing bilateral bank-firm credit exposures. We assess the differential impact on market participants...

Do macroprudential regulations on residential lending influence commercial lending behavior too? To answer this question, we identify the compositional changes in banks' supply of credit using the variation in their holdings of residential mortgages on which extra capital requirements were...