Capital market inefficiencies, credit rationing and lending relationship in SME's

Abstract

The financing of small-medium enterprises (SME' s) shows a great dependence on short term borrowing from banking institutions and savings banks. The causes of this situation are basically due to low credit availability at the stage of the firm' s life cycle when it requires the greatest access. A seminal paper by Fazzari, Hubbard and Petersen (1988) has served as the basis for important subsequent research. In Spain conclusions drawn by studies in this area mostly agree that the basic reason for the aboye mentioned low credit availability is high borrowing costs due to market imperfections which inevitably lead to credit ratioIÚng. The aim of this paper is twofold. First, to study the roles of firm-creditor relationships (Berger and Udell, 1992,1995; Petersen and Rajan, 1994, 1995) and Loan Guarantee Associations [LGA] in reducing information asymmetries in loan contracts and, second, to attempt to ascertain whether these factors are among the determining factors of loan rates for SME's.