We document significant differences in the financing structure of small firms with managers of diverse cultural backgrounds. To isolate the effect of culture, we exploit cultural heterogeneity within a geographical area with shared regulations, institutions, and macroeconomic cycles. Our...

We exploit the exogenous COVID-19 shock in a bicultural area of Italy to identify cultural differences in the way companies respond to economic shocks, and in their resilience to those shocks. Firms with managers of diverse cultural backgrounds resort to different forms of government aid,...

This paper analyzes whether the financial distress of a firm affects the investment decisions of non-distressed competitors. On average, firms in distress impose indirect costs to non-distressed competitors by increasing costs of credit in the industry and hence restricting credit access and...