Crédits interentreprises et délais de paiement : une théorie financière

Trade credits are the main source of firm's external finance, despite they are observationally more expensive than bank loans. The aim of this paper is to study this type of credit. We describe the optimal debt structure for firms, when the latter can get funds from their banks and from their suppliers, and when they can choose the maturity of trade credits. We make two main contributions. First, we propose an explanation of the use of trade credits. Second, we propose an explanation for the observed variability of the delays of payments across firms and time.