We examine the firm-level and country-level determinants of the currency denomination of small business loans. We introduce an information asymmetry between banks and firms in a model that also features the trade-off between the cost of debt and firm-level distress costs. Banks in our model...

We model the choice of loan currency in a framework which features a trade-off between lower cost of debt and the risk of firm-level distress costs. Under perfect information foreign currency funds come at a lower interest rate, all foreign currency earners as well as those local currency...

Motivated by current concerns over foreign currency exposures in emerging economies, we examine the currency denomination of business loans made in Bulgaria prior to the current crisis. We analyze information on the requested and granted currency for more than hundred thousand loans granted by...

Based on survey data covering 8,387 firms in 20 countries we compare credit demand and credit supply for firms in Eastern Europe to those for firms in selected Western European countries.

Abstract: We study the international transmission of shocks from the banking to the real sector during the global financial crisis. For identification, we use matched bank-firm level data, including many small and medium-sized firms, in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. We find that...