This paper studies the bank-level (size and access to funds) and market-based (interest rate, inflation rate, GDP) variables’ impact on bank lending behavior in Turkey using quarterly bank level data of 15 private commercial banks and 3 state-owned banks for the 2003-2012 period. The empirical...

Using the entire universe of Bankscope and Amadeus Top 250,000 we construct the portfolios of shareholders who hold equity stakes in publicly traded and privately held European banks for each year over the period 1999–2008. We show that about 62% of banks' ultimate largest shareholders are...

Through their contribution to the creation of added value and new jobs, the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) have a significant role in the economic and social development of a country. However, these enterprises are facing numerous obstacles that limit their performance, growth and...

Measuring and identifying financial constraints represents an important challenge in empirical studies. Due to data limitations perception-based indicators or approximations of access to finance by the usage of finance are often used, disregarding firm-specific differences in the demand for...

Access to finance is a prerequisite for economic development. Existing studies measure access by the use of finance. We develop a direct measurement for access to finance from the Business Environment and Enterprise Performance Survey 2005 data. We determine whether a firm without a loan does...

This paper examines the effects of political agreements on regional financial integration (RFI) on financial market development and access to and cost of finance in Sub-Saharan Africa. Our results suggest that RFI positively affects financial development - measured very broadly as the size of...

Although microfinance institutions across the world are moving from group lending towards individual lending, this strategic shift is not substantiated by sufficient empirical evidence on the impact of both types of lending on borrowers. We present such evidence from a randomised field...