SME ACCESS TO FINANCE AND THE GLOBAL FINANCIAL CRISIS

Abstract

This paper offers an overview of research on SME access to finance during the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) in order to cull key things that we have learned. It discusses selected articles that peg the frontier of knowledge on this topic in both European and American contexts. It highlights differences between these two areas in terms of how the crisis unfolded. It also identifies key differences in the availability of data between Europe and the US that shape the nature of the empirical analysis of the attendant credit crunch. Selected research on both the nature and magnitude of the impact of the credit crunch on the SME sector are discussed. Research on some key policy initiatives to mitigate the crisis’ damage in Europe and in the US are also discussed. The paper concludes with some comments on how research on the GFC might inform research on SME access to finance during the unfolding COVID-19 crisis.