This dissertation studies the effects of credit availability on firm-level outcomes using a new matched employer-employee panel of Chilean firms that also includes firm-bank lending and tax data. In Chapter I, using a natural experiment and a differences in differences approach, I show that firms that experienced a positive credit supply shock during the 2008-09 recession in Chile, exhibit higher labor productivity four years after the shock, even after aggregate demand and credit supply have fully recovered. Chapter II presents evidence consistent with the hypothesis that at least part of the productivity improvement is due to an increased ability of firms with access to credit to adjust labor during the recession. In particular, I find that these firms exhibit larger worker flows and use credit to adjust employment by churning more workers. Chapter III studies a government partial credit guarantee scheme for bank loans to small and medium sized enterprises using a regression discontinuity design around the threshold for eligibility. I show that the program has a large positive causal effect on firms' total borrowing, and the effect is persistent. Moreover, firms that obtain bank loans through this scheme can borrow more from loans not insured by the guarantee, which means that the program has a positive effect on the firms's total borrowing capacity. Finally, the program also helps in the formation of new bank-firm lending relationships.

This thesis consists of three related essays that examine the role of information in the market for corporate debt. The three essays collectively examine the role of information produced by the firm and its agents on alleviating information asymmetries facing public debtholders. In particular, the thesis examines the impact of bondholders' demand for reputation and information on the firm's disclosure choices and accounting attributes; and the impact of information produced by monitoring the firm's private debt before its entry to the public debt market on the yield spread of its initial bond. The first essay investigates the influence of public corporate debt on the willingness of UK firms to issue profit warnings. UK firms operate within a legal environment that is less litigious compared to their US counterparts. This setting allows for motives other than fear of litigation to affect UK companies' decision to warn. The results of this essay indicate that UK firms with public debt are more forthcoming with the disclosure of permanent negative news. Also, the results show that UK firms without public debt are more likely to hide bad news when they are closer to financial distress. However, for firms with public debt, the results indicate that the effect of closeness to financial distress on the willingness to warn is attenuated. These findings suggest that firms with public debt are deterred from hiding negative news for fear of damaging their reputation for truthful and timely disclosure. Public debt appears to act as a disciplinary mechanism on corporate disclosure policy.The second essay examines the impact of the initial public debt offering (IPDO) on the timeliness properties of the firm's accounting income. Firms are more likely to communicate with private lenders on a private, insider-basis, while they are more likely to communicate with bondholders using public information. Therefore, bondholders, compared to private lenders, are expected to be more sensitive to the quality of public information. The results indicate that firms adopt a timelier policy of economic loss recognition after their initial public debt offering using Basu's (1997) time series measure of timely loss recognition. These findings suggest that firms face higher demand for public information from a large number of external and dispersed bondholders.The third essay investigates the impact of information associated with prior private debt financing on the yield spread of companies' initial public debt offerings. Specifically, this essay focuses on information produced through monitoring by credit rating agencies and monitoring by banks. The findings indicate that IPDOs with the same or upgraded credit ratings enjoy significantly lower yield spreads. This finding suggests that changes in credit ratings could convey new information to investors regarding the firm's commitment to maintain a high credit quality. In addition, the findings of this essay indicate that strong banking relationships significantly reduce yield spreads for initial public debt offerings. This suggests that a strong banking relationship conveys a positive signal to bondholders regarding the bank's assessment of the quality of the firm.

Nel primo capitolo si propone una rassegna della letteratura di ambito economico e manageriale in tema di Responsabilità Sociale d’Impresa (RSI). Successivamente, si identificano le peculiarità degli attori operanti nel settore bancario etico. Infine, si comparano i risultati degli studi sul comportamento delle banche etiche con quelli disponibili sulle banche tradizionali. Il secondo capitolo confronta le condizioni di rifinanziamento delle banche sociali con quelle delle banche standard, quando le prime dispongono di informazioni private sulla qualità dei clienti. Ciò comporta il noto problema dell’hold-up, che tuttavia può essere attenuato dai costi delle peculiari attività di selezione e monitoraggio delle banche etiche. Ne risulta che, indipendentemente dalla qualità del cliente, le banche standard potrebbero offrire condizioni di prestito più vantaggiose di quelle delle banche etiche. Il terzo capitolo usa un modello spaziale per descrivere come le banche sociali e standard definiscono i loro tassi di interesse quando competono nel mercato dei depositi e dei prestiti. Come suggerisce l’evidenza empirica, i risparmiatori delle banche sociali sono disposti ad accettare tassi più bassi di quelli del mercato. Pertanto, si determinano le condizioni per cui ciò si verifica e si studia quando questo è compatibile con tassi più bassi anche sui prestiti. / In the first chapter, we begin with a survey on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in economics, management and business literatures. Then we identify the peculiarities of the agents operating in the social banking sector. Thereafter, we compare and contrast the contributions focused on the behavior of social banks with those available on traditional lenders. The second chapter compares the refinancing behavior of social banks with that of standard lenders when the former have inside information on the quality of the borrowers. This entails the renowned hold-up problem which, however, can be mitigated by the costs of the ethical screening and monitoring activities of social banks. As a result, standard banks may offer better loan contracts and attract high quality borrowers. The third chapter proposes a spatial competition model to investigate how standard and social banks set their interest rates when they compete in the deposit and loan markets. As the empirical evidence suggests, social depositors are willing to accept returns lower than the market level. Therefore we determine under which conditions social banks pay deposit rates lower than those of standard banks and when this is compatible with lower rates also on loans.