Can foreign portfolio investment bridge the small firm financing gap around the world ?

"The author examines the impact of foreign portfolio investment on the financial constraints of small firms. Using a dataset of over 195,000 firm-year observations across 53 countries, she examines the impact of foreign portfolio investment on capital issuance and firm growth across countries and firm characteristics, in particular size. After controlling for firm-, industry-, and country-level characteristics such as change in foreign exchange rate, share of market capitalization, relative interest rates, and investment climate, she finds that foreign portfolio investment helps to bridge the gap between the amounts of financing small firms require and that which they can access through the capital markets. Specifically, the author finds that foreign portfolio investment is associated with an increased ability to issue publicly traded securities for small firms in all nations, regardless of property rights development. Since small firms often rely heavily on bank lending, she also tests for potential increases in credit for small firms using the bank lending theory of monetary transmission. Results show significantly decreased short-term debt and increased long-term debt, supporting the contention that bank debt maturity to these firms has increased. This transition to longer-term debt could also be a result of the increased public debt securities these firms are more able to access. The overall increased access to capital only leads to value-enhancing growth at the firm level in nations with more developed property rights, underscoring the significance of a good financial system that minimizes information asymmetry as well as corruption, and enhances liquidity as well as property rights. "--World Bank web site.