中文摘要
信息匮乏是中小企业开展出口活动的重要障碍。本文分析银行能否通过减少有关国外市场的信息不对称来支持企业出口。我们使用一个大样本意大利企业数据，将海关数据与其贷款银行的信息相匹配。基于既有信贷关系，并利用企业国内银行被国际化银行集团收购这一事件，我们识别出一个相对于企业出口决策外生的冲击。结果表明，收购发生后，企业开始向合并后银行设有境外分支机构的国家出口的概率显著提高；境外分支机构可作为银行所积累、并能与客户企业共享的信息量的代理变量。相反，出口集约边际上的处理效应大多不显著。借助一个简化的理论框架，我们将这些发现解释为信息溢出的证据，这种溢出主要降低了企业进入国外市场的固定成本。分析还表明，银行信贷可得性或贸易融资供给等其他渠道不太可能是驱动我们结果的原因。
Abstract
Abstract The lack of information is a relevant obstacle to the export activity of small and medium enterprises. This paper analyzes whether banks can support firms’ exports by reducing informational asymmetries about foreign markets. We exploit a large sample of Italian firms for which we merge customs data with information on their lender banks. We identify a shock exogenous to firms’ export decisions by relying on preexisting lending relationships and exploiting the acquisition of a firm’s domestic bank by an internationalized banking group. Our results show that, after the acquisition, firms have a significantly higher probability of starting exports in countries where the consolidated bank has a foreign branch, which proxies for the amount of information accumulated that can be shared with client firms. Conversely, the treatment effect on the intensive margins of exports is largely insignificant. Using a stylized theoretical framework, we interpret our findings as evidence of information spillovers that mainly reduce firms’ fixed entry costs in a foreign market. The analysis also shows that other channels, such as bank credit availability or trade finance supply, are unlikely to drive our results.