Access to external finance is a key challenge for the creation, survival and growth of SMEs. This article delves into the “weak funding” handicap of rural small firms (SEs): the access to bank financing and the substitutive role of trade credit for entrepreneurs in rural areas when they...

We document that European banks charge higher interest rates on loans granted to small and medium-sized firms located in areas at high risk of flooding. At 6 basis points, the average risk premium does not adequately reflect the deterioration of loan performance in the aftermath of flood...

In this paper we study the determinants of use of formal and informal credit sources. Given that awareness is a necessary step towards use of credit, in order to control for the possible selection bias we decompose the decision to use credit as a two stage decision process in which first,...