The Relationship between Borrower Risk and Loan Maturity in Small Business Lending
利用德国企业新贷款数据，发现借款人风险与贷款期限呈显著正相关，且信息不对称和借款人议价能力会影响该关系。
Abstract: We investigate the relationship between borrower risk and loan maturity in small business lending. Using a rich dataset on new loans extended to German firms, we find a robust, significantly positive, monotonic risk‐maturity relation. We show that this relation becomes stronger when asymmetric information is high and weaker when borrower bargaining power is high, and that borrower bargaining power affects the risk‐maturity relation differently depending on whether asymmetric information is high or low. Our results show that both the signalling hypothesis and view that relationship lenders provide assistance to borrowers explain the positive risk‐maturity relation, and that borrower bargaining power influences this relation.