银行贷款、融资制约和中小企业投资外文翻译.doc

银行贷款、融资制约和中小企业投资外文翻译 外文翻译原文Bank lending, financing constraints, SME investment Material Source: Proceedings Author: Santiago Carbo-Valverde The ability of firms to optimally exploit investment opportunities may crucially depend on the level of financial constraints that they face. SMEs may be particularly vulnerable because these firms are more opaque and thus susceptible to more credit rationing. Inquiry into the presence of financing constraints began in earnest with Fazzari et al. 1988 and their investigation of investment-cash flow sensitivity. However, this line of inquiry has been quite controversial. In particular, Kaplan and Zingales 1997 and 2000 have shown that correlation between investment and cash flow may not be a good indicator of financial constraints. In this paper we move this line of inquiry in a somewhat different direction. In some sense we look at the “dual〞 of the cash flow-investment sensitivity argument. Fazzari et al. 1988 argue that because financially constrained firms have limited access to external finance, their ability to exploit wealth-improving investment opportunities will be sensitive to their ability to finance these projects internally ? that is, it will be sensitive to their cash flow. From an econometric perspective the cash flow variable may be problematic because, among other things, it may be correlated with omitted variables e.g., Caballero and Leahy, 1996. To minimize these problems we take a more direct approach. Specifically, we instead focus on bank loans rather than cash flow in a sample of SMEs for whom bank loans are likely the least costly form of external finance. Our argument here is that just as the capital expenditures of less constrained firms are less likely to be sensitive to cash flow, they are more likely to be sensitive to bank loan funding. That is, unconstrained firms will utilize low cost bank loans to finance capital expenditures. In particular, we hypothesize that increased bank loan funding will not be associated with increased capital expenditures for unconstrained constrained firms. The only other economically significant source of external funding for SMEs is trade credit, although it is generally considered to be more costly than bank loans e.g. Petersen and Rajan, 1994, 1995. So, we also examine the sensitivity of investment to trade credit. Our investigation of trade credit will enable us to draw some inferences about the substitutability of trade credit and bank loans. In addition, we investigate the supply side of trade credit ? in particular, whether unconstrained firms are more likely to extend trade credit i.e., “invest in〞 trade credit by using bank loans. We also extend the literature on financial constraints by examining predictability. That is, we go beyond just the estimated correlation between bank loans and investment, between trade credit and investment, and between accounts receivable and bank loans and investigate the casual links. By way of preview we find that investment is sensitive to bank loans for unconstrained firms ? but not for constrained firms. We also find that trade credit predicts investment, but only for constrained firms. This suggests that constrained firms, whose access to bank loans is limited, resort to trade financing. Finally, we find that for unconstrained firms, bank loans cause accounts receivable ? that is, unconstrained firms use bank loans to finance trade credit i.e. invest in accounts receivable. The literature on financing constraints, external finance and investment Firms depend on a variety of sources of financing, both internal and external. The relationships among these sources and their effects on investment, however, remain unclear in the literature. In the case of SMEs, bank loans and trade credit are the main two alternatives of external funding. Since bank lending may be the cheapest source of external funding, access to bank lending may condition the demand for trade credit. Dependence on trade credit, arguably the most expensive source of credit and the degree of financial constraints will also depend on the internal source of funding from cash flow. The effects of bank loans on investment decisions have been mostly explored in cross-country studies. In particular, as predicted in the finance-growth literature, bank lending to firms may foster investment and growth. This finance-growth nexus has been presented both as an endogenous growth model whereby bank loans and even trade credit stimulate firm investment and from a monetary perspective showing the response of lending by banks to changes in monetary policy and its effects on aggregate output or even the likely substitution of bank loans for trade credit during a monetary tightening. An alternative strand of the literature on financing constraints has focused on the extent to which bank loans and trade credit are complements or substitutes. This st。