Whether public lending to firms effectively eases credit constraints has been widely studied for very small businesses. The evidence documented for larger firms refers to lending that is significantly subsidized and targeted to these businesses, so the estimated positive effects may reflect poor...

This paper explores the links between labor formality, access to credit and firm performance in Colombia using Annual Manufacturing Survey data for the period 2000-2009. A significant though small relationship is found between access to credit and informality. The results suggest that a 10...

This paper studies the effect of government-backed partial credit guarantees on firms' performance in Colombia. These guarantees are automatically granted by the National Guarantee Fund (NGF) to firms without enough collateral in order to lift their credit constraints. We put together a panel of...

Using transactions-level customs data from Colombia, we study firm-specific export patterns over the period 1996-2005. Our data allow us to track firms' entry and exit into and out of individual destination markets, as well as their revenues from selling there. We find that, in a typical year,...

In a healthy economy, plant turnover increases aggregate productivity because efficient producers are more likely to survive. Given high entry and exit rates and the potential importance of turnover in accounting for aggregate productivity, in this paper we examine the determinants of plant...