Nonbank Lending

Sergey Chernenko, Isil Erel, Robert Prilmeier

NBER Working Paper No. 26458
Issued in November 2019
NBER Program(s):Corporate Finance Program

We provide novel systematic evidence on the extent and terms of direct lending by nonbank financial institutions, and explore whether banks are still special in lending to informationally opaque firms. Analyzing hand-collected data for a random sample of publicly-traded middle-market firms during the 2010-2015 period, we show that nonbank lending is widespread, with 32% of all loans being extended by nonbanks. Nonbank borrowers are less profitable, more levered, and more volatile than bank borrowers. Firms with a small negative EBITDA are 34% more likely to borrow from a nonbank than firms with a small positive EBITDA. While nonbank lenders are less likely to monitor by including financial covenants, they are more likely to align incentives through the use of warrants. Controlling for firm and loan characteristics, nonbank loans carry 190 basis points higher interest rates. Overall, our results provide evidence of market segmentation in the commercial loan market, where bank and nonbank lenders utilize different lending techniques and cater to different types of borrowers.

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Document Object Identifier (DOI): 10.3386/w26458