{"title":"Fostering SME survival through insolvency proceedings: a legitimacy perspective on retrenchment, age, and firm-specific distress","authors":"Rachid Achbah, Marc Fréchet","doi":"10.1007/s11187-024-00874-7","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p>This study examines the interaction between insolvency proceedings and strategic variables and their relationship with firm survival. Unlike previous research, this study considers the firm’s legal status, including insolvency proceedings, and fills a gap in the literature by considering legal considerations in business studies. Adopting a legitimacy perspective, we employ a Cox proportional hazards model to construct a survival model based on a theoretical framework encompassing insolvency proceedings retrenchment, firm age, and causes of financial distress. Our sample consists of French SMEs facing financial difficulties. The findings reveal that initiating insolvency proceedings is negatively associated with firm survival. However, retrenchment of employees or assets during insolvency proceedings is associated with a higher likelihood of survival. Contrary to expectations, firm age showed a negative association with firm survival during the insolvency proceedings. Moreover, the study revealed a positive association between insolvency proceedings and firm survival in cases of firm-specific financial distress. This research provides new insights into the relationship between insolvency proceedings and firm survival.</p>","PeriodicalId":21803,"journal":{"name":"Small Business Economics","volume":"100 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.5000,"publicationDate":"2024-02-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Small Business Economics","FirstCategoryId":"96","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-024-00874-7","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"BUSINESS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
This study examines the interaction between insolvency proceedings and strategic variables and their relationship with firm survival. Unlike previous research, this study considers the firm’s legal status, including insolvency proceedings, and fills a gap in the literature by considering legal considerations in business studies. Adopting a legitimacy perspective, we employ a Cox proportional hazards model to construct a survival model based on a theoretical framework encompassing insolvency proceedings retrenchment, firm age, and causes of financial distress. Our sample consists of French SMEs facing financial difficulties. The findings reveal that initiating insolvency proceedings is negatively associated with firm survival. However, retrenchment of employees or assets during insolvency proceedings is associated with a higher likelihood of survival. Contrary to expectations, firm age showed a negative association with firm survival during the insolvency proceedings. Moreover, the study revealed a positive association between insolvency proceedings and firm survival in cases of firm-specific financial distress. This research provides new insights into the relationship between insolvency proceedings and firm survival.
期刊介绍:
Small Business Economics: An Entrepreneurship Journal (SBEJ) publishes original, rigorous theoretical and empirical research addressing all aspects of entrepreneurship and small business economics, with a special emphasis on the economic and societal relevance of research findings for scholars, practitioners and policy makers.
SBEJ covers a broad scope of topics, ranging from the core themes of the entrepreneurial process and new venture creation to other topics like self-employment, family firms, small and medium-sized enterprises, innovative start-ups, and entrepreneurial finance. SBEJ welcomes scientific studies at different levels of analysis, including individuals (e.g. entrepreneurs'' characteristics and occupational choice), firms (e.g., firms’ life courses and performance, innovation, and global issues like digitization), macro level (e.g., institutions and public policies within local, regional, national and international contexts), as well as cross-level dynamics.
As a leading entrepreneurship journal, SBEJ welcomes cross-disciplinary research.
Officially cited as: Small Bus Econ