The effects of mutual guarantee consortia on the quality of bank lending

In this paper we investigate whether or not mutual guarantee consortia (MGC), a financial institution well developed in Italy, alleviate the difficulties that Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) face when they ask for a bank loan. We find that the probability of a small firm affiliated to a MGC of going into default is lower than that of firms not affiliated to such a consortium. These results indicate that MGCs improve the ability of banks to screen and monitor small firms.