We empirically examine the impact of bank consolidation on bank acquisition of soft information about borrowers. Using … complexity upon a merger, rather than a post-merger cost-cut, is likely to cause a negative and significant impact on soft …

results indicate that, relative to counties where the acquirer had operations before the merger, local SBL declined … significantly more in counties where only the target had operations before the merger. This result holds even after controlling for … funding to local small businesses. The absence of local community banks that became a target of a merger or acquisition by …