Disrupted lending relationship and borrower's strategic default: evidence from the tourism industry during the Greek economic crisis

Using a sample of bank loans to firms operating in the tourism industry for the period 2010-2015, and regional variation of tourism activities to identify the strategic defaulted firms, we examine the impact of Greek banks consolidation on the firms’ payment behavior. We show that a merger-induced impairment of the lending relationship is related to a higher likelihood of strategic default by the target bank’s borrowers. In contrast, mergers with a limited impact on the lending relationship have no effect on the probability of strategic default of target bank’s borrowers. The results highlight the importance of relationship lending benefits in strategic default decisions. Our findings are robust to the alternative interpretation of soft budget constraints.