The SME finance gap in the European Union

Abstract

This paper presents SME financing gaps across European countries over the period 2013 to 2020, using two different methodologies, one reliant on firm balance sheets and one on firm-level surveys. We show significant variation in financing gaps across countries and sectors. Variation over time, on the other hand, is not as strong or intuitive. The account- and survey-based measures are only weakly correlated with each other, reflecting their different nature, and both are only weakly correlated with a survey-based measure of self-reported firm financing constraints.