This article examines the role of relationship lending in small firm finance. We examine price and nonprice terms of bank lines of credit (L/C) extended to small firms. Our focus on bank L/Cs allows us to examine a type of loan contract in which the bank-borrower relationship is likely to be an...

We formulate and test hypotheses about the role of bank type – small versus large, single-market versus multimarket, and local versus nonlocal banks – in banking relationships. The conventional paradigm suggests that "community banks" – small, single market, local institutions – are...