The recent economic and financial crisis has drawn attention to how mutual guarantee institutions (MGIs) facilitate small and medium enterprises in accessing bank financing. The aim of this paper is twofold. First, we describe the structural features of the Italian market for mutual guarantees...

This paper uses ECB survey data to assess whether gender matters in the small firms' financial structure and access to credit. Firms owned or managed by women (female firms) use smaller amounts and less heterogeneous sources of external finance than their male counterparts. According to...