exploit two shocks to Italian bank CDS spreads and equity valuations: the 2007-2009 financial crisis and the 2010 …-2012 sovereign debt crisis. Using newly available data linking over 3,000, mostly privately-held, non-financial firms to their bank …

’s domestic bank by an internationalized banking group. Our results show that, after the acquisition, firms have a significantly … higher probability of starting export in countries where the consolidated bank has a foreign branch, which proxies for the … mainly reduce firms’ fixed entry costs in a foreign market. The analysis also shows that other channels, such as bank credit …