Publications

Publications

Lending technologies, loan pricing and customer profitability in SME lending

Lending technologies, loan pricing and customer profitability in SME lending

This paper provides empirical evidence of the indirect effects of lending technologies on loan pricing and customer profitability in bank–firm relationships. I define the incremental information gathered by the bank’s corporate analysis department as a relationship lending technology, whereas the other loans are contracted using transactions lending technology. Using the unique data of Finnish privately held firms, I find that loan pricing is positively associated with customer profitability in firms that are monitored using transactions lending technology. However, in firms that are monitored using relationship lending technology the profitability of the relationship is generated from sources other than loan pricing. In addition, when the level of information asymmetry related to chosen lending technology is mitigated by the analysis of the bank’s corporate analysis department, the role of quantified soft information in bank–firm relationships is emphasized more in loan contracting than hard information is. These findings improve our understanding of the overall package of banking services under asymmetric information and the role of soft information in bank–firm relationships.

Credit Risk & ScoringFintech