Does Innovation Affect Credit Access? New Empirical Evidence from Italian Small Business Lending

In this paper we analyze the access to credit of innovative firms on the price and non-price dimensions of bank lending. Using information from two datasets, we use a propensity score matching procedure to estimate the impact of the innovative nature of firms on: (a) loan interest rates; (b) the probability of having to post collateral; and (c) the probability of overdrawing. Our analysis reveals that banks trade off higher interest rates and lower collateral requirements for firms involved in innovative processes. Further, innovative firms have a lower probability of being credit rationed than their non-innovative peers.