Female Skin in the Game: Bridging the Gender Financing Gap

I examine the role of skin in the game, such as paid-up equity or collateral, in narrowing the gender financing gap in entrepreneurship. I find, first, that skin in the game reduces this gap: a 10 percent increase in collateral value raises bank debt by around 4 percent for women—twice as much as for men. Similarly, one standard deviation increase in paid-up equity ratio (46 percentage points) boosts bank debt by 6.22 percent more for female-owned firms, or at least 1.7 times more than for men. This aligns with cross-country evidence that more equal property rights are linked to better access to credit for women and improved conditions for female entrepreneurship. Second, I find the return on investment from an additional dollar of debt is higher for women, implying that women face more significant financial constraints and forgo higher NPV projects. The economic magnitude is large: for a female-owned business with one standard deviation larger leverage, the performance gap (2 percentage points lower ROA for females) shrinks by at least 60 percent. My findings imply that policies like subsidizing unsecured credit or increasing collateral availability for women (e.g., through property rights) could help reduce the gender financing gap.

Selected presentations: 2024 FMA Annual Meeting in Dallas; CEPR Women in Economics: WE ARE Seminar Series; Boca-ECGI Corporate Finance and Governance Conference; CEPR Conference on Sustainable Financial Intermediation in Luxembourg; 3rd Workshop on Gender and Economics at U Luxembourg; AEFIN 32nd Finance Forum (PhD Mentoring Day and main conference); International Conference of the French Finance Association (AFFI) PhD Workshop; Sustainable Finance Research Forum 2024; ESADE Business School Finance Seminar; UPF Internal Applied Economics seminar; 2024 European Financial Management Association (EFMA) Doctoral Seminar; Cat´olica Lisbon SBE Seminar; KU Leuven lunch seminar.

Board Diversity and Sectoral Gender Disparities

I study the impact of board gender quotas focusing on the importance of gender diversity in traditionally male-dominated sectors, such as Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Finance (STEM&F). I find that, first, the market reaction to California’s 2018 board gender diversity law was relatively positive for firms in STEM&F sectors (-1.1 percent) compared to other sectors (-3.8 percent). This cannot be attributed to hiring more qualified female directors; in fact, the increased demand for women on boards was accompanied by a decrease in qualifications for female directors in all sectors. Instead, it is consistent with research showing diverse boards enhance innovation. Second, the sectoral gender gap—20 percent lower board diversity in STEM&F compared to other sectors—disappeared after the law, but it widened in other states potentially due to director relocations across states. These findings highlight the importance of incorporating sector-specific implications of gender quotas, especially the ones targeting the higher tiers of employment, where the pool of qualified candidates is limited. 

Selected presentations: AEFIN 31st Finance Forum PhD Mentoring Day; 2023 Babson College Diana International Research Conference; 2022 FMA Conference Doctoral Student Consortium; 2021 EFMA Doctoral Seminar.

Financial Innovation and Female Access to Finance

The Power of Words (with Urszula Ayache, Univeristy of Oslo)

Gender Diversity and Green Innovation (with Filiz Unsal, OECD)


Personal Wealth and the Gender Gap in Entrepreneurship (with Vítor Pereira Santos, Católica Lisbon School of Business & Economics)