Neither true nor fairweather friend: relationship banking and SME borrowing under Covid-19
研究了新冠疫情前中小企业与银行的关系紧密度是否有助于疫情期间获得贷款，发现关系型银行在疫情前重要，但疫情后影响有限，银行对关系好与不好的企业一视同仁。
A growing literature addresses the costs and benefits associated with relationship banking, particularly for smaller firms, but with much of this work focused on normal trading conditions. Covid-19 provides an ideal testbed to explore the resilience of relationship banking. We examine whether the presence of closer pre-Covid ties between SMEs and their banks helps in accessing funds in the Covid-19 pandemic period. Then are ties between relationship bankers and SME borrowers a case of ‘true love’ or rather are the parties more akin to ‘fair-weather friends?’ Data from the UK SME Finance Monitor from 2018Q2-2020Q3 is used in this paper to examine this question. Our analysis suggests that relationship banking was important for the acquisition of bank credit pre-Covid-19 but was of limited influence in post-Covid-19 lending behaviour. Banks treated SMEs that had a good relationship with them in the same way as those that did not and with public interventions to support lenders material in this.