PUBLICATIONS

"Information Technology and Credit: Evidence from Public Guarantees " with F. De Marco, Forthcoming, Management Science

winner of the 9th SUERF/UniCredit Foundation Prize 2022

Presented at: AFA (2021), SIPA/BPI Columbia Annual Conference (2021), EIEF (2021), Corporate Finance Day (2021), Credit Risk over the Business Cycle - Bundesbank (2021), EBA (2021), CBI Workshop (2021)*, FINEST Banking Conference (2020), Erasmus School of Economics (2020), Bocconi University (2020)*, University of Padua (2020)*

This paper investigates whether banks' information technology (IT) and physical branch presence affect the supply of government guaranteed credit. For identification, we exploit loan level data and the institutional features of the Italian public guarantee scheme during Covid-19. We find that banks with better IT provide more, cheaper and faster guaranteed loans, but the structure of local banking markets still matters: banks with better IT charge lower rates in less concentrated markets. Moreover, despite the high volume of online loan applications, guaranteed lending remained local: banks lent more in their core markets and where they have a larger market share.

Media coverage: Italy's deleveraging success could help limit messy COVID-19 defaults (S&P Global Market Intelligence, 2021)

"Female Innovative Entrepreneurship and Maternity Risk", Forthcoming, Review of Finance

Presented at: XXXIV SIEP Conference (2022), 3rd Brazilian Meeting on Family and Gender Economics (2022), 4th INSEAD-Doriot Entrepreneurship Conference (2022), 2nd Discrimination and Diversity Workshop UEA (2022), Erasmus School Economics (2020), BI Oslo (2020), KU Leuven (2020), University of Bristol (2020), LSE (2019), QMUL 2nd Economics and Finance PhD Workshop (2019)

I investigate how female innovative entrepreneurship responds to shocks to maternity risk, defined as the possibility of unexpected pregnancies. Exploiting the liberalization of an emergency contraception pill in Italy, combined with cross-sectional variation in access to abortion, I find that lower maternity risk leads to an increase in equity holdings, initial investments, and probability of being executive of younger female founders. Firms with more female-held equity also become riskier but more likely to attract venture capital in their early stages. Therefore, decreasing maternity risk reduces the gender gap in entrepreneurship, and it allows women to select into riskier ventures.

Media Coverage: SHE Leads Dashboard (Erasmus Center for Entrepreneurship, 2023)

WORKING PAPERS

"Bank Market Power and Firm Creation in Innovative Industries" 

Presented at:  MFA (2023), Benelux Banking Day (2022), 5th EntFin Association Conference (2021), EFiC (2021), 37th AFFI Conference (2021), 7th Emerging Scholars in Banking and Finance Conference (2020), 4th Junior Entrepreneurial Finance and Innovation Workshop (2020), LSE (2018), HEC Paris PhD Conference (2017)

I examine how banking competition affects the creation of innovative firms. Exploiting the 2012 Start-Up Italy Act, designed to foster the creation of innovative firms through public bank guarantees, I document that the policy increased the creation of innovative firms by 24% between 2012 and 2015. Using a difference-in-difference-in-differences design, I show that this effect is more than halved in provinces where banking competition is weaker. This leads to fewer venture capital deals, less guaranteed lending, and lower leverage for these firms, resulting in higher entrepreneurial migration. I conclude that bank market power is detrimental to innovative firm creation.

Media Coverage: All About Finance (World Bank, 2021) 

"Advantageous Selection in Fintech Loans", with M. Pelosi 

Using data from the largest online lender in the United States, we document advantageous selection in loan amount. Exploiting a natural experiment within the platform, we show that borrowers who select larger loans are less likely to default. This selection is driven by households in states with bankruptcy-friendly laws, where borrowers' default costs are lower. A simple model of household borrowing shows that our results can be explained by the fact that borrowers facing higher loan prices search more intensively for cheaper loans. This effect is stronger for the safest borrowers, as they enjoy the greatest benefits from switching. 

ACTIVE WORKS IN PROGRESS

"Media coverage of female Economists, Business, and Finance scholars", with I. Lachana and M. Xu

winner of the AFFECT/JFE Proposal Grant 2023

"Caught in the Web: Employment within VC Portfolios", with M. Ryduchowska and S. Wang

Presented at : ESE (2022), BI Oslo (2021)

Media Coverage: Seattle Times (2023)

"Bank Board Diversity and Women's Access to Credit: Evidence from Italy", with A. D'andrea, T. Eisert, and D. Urban

"Do incubators foster the quantity and quality of innovation in the local ecosystems? Evidence from a developed country"  with P. Landoni and G. Sansone

We hand-collect a novel dataset of the universe of Italian incubators. We use this dataset to investigate what is the contribution of these institutions to the quantity and quality of innovation in local entrepreneurial ecosystems.

NON-ACTIVE WORKS IN PROGRESS

"Liaisons Dangereuses - Relationship Banking and the Venture Capital Industry"

Presented at: LSE (2017)

I study how the existence of benefits from relationship lending in the banking sector could be detrimental to the scope and success of Venture Capital. I construct a model in which entrepreneurial choices are tilted towards less innovative projects to reap the benefits of relationship banking. On the one hand, this allows entrepreneurs using bank lending to overcome credit constraints, generated by high monitoring costs. On the other hand, relationship banking benefits cause the entrepreneur to opt for more traditional projects, forgoing more profitable innovative projects and VC financing. The mechanism is exacerbated by higher costs to obtain venture capital and lower VC expertise (i.e. lower VC value added). The model shows how banks and venture capitalists are linked through entrepreneurial choice and how relationship banking can be a factor in explaining the lack of success of certain countries in developing venture capital industries.

"On Timing of Share Repurchases" with M. Xu

Using a new, hand-collected, data-set on all open market share repurchases by publicly traded companies in the UK, we investigate patterns and dynamics of these transactions.