Trade credit and textiles manufacturers' behaviour during the Great Depression in the Kingdom of Italy: Insights from the analysis of bankruptcy proceedings accounting data

Abstract

Introduction: The focus of this paper is on textiles industry dynamics in the King-dom of Italy during the Great Depression. Despite the crisis and the spread of bankruptcies, the textile sector experienced an almost constant rate of growth, thanks also to trade credit granted by manufacturers. Aim of the work: Through the analysis of bankruptcy proceedings accounting data, the authors tried to catch how the geographical localisation of customers (small bankrupt retailers) has influenced the grant of trade credit by textile manufacturers. Methodological approach: This work is based on the exam of financial information collected by the "Unione Commercianti in Manifatture di Milano", in the period 1898-1902, over more than 1,700 bankruptcy proceedings in the textiles industry. For 512 cases, accounting data were reported in the journal of the Union. The au-thors have aggregated at national, macro-regional and regional level accounting data of the procedures. Main findings: The analysis highlights that the growth of textile industry was ac-companied by a wide fragmentation of trade credits, pushing manufactures to dif-ferentiate their behaviour according to the geographical localisation of customers. The analysis also offered some interesting insight about textiles sector dynamics in the Kingdom of Italy, at national, macro-regional and regional level. Originality: The paper permits to enlarge the understanding of textile industry dy-namics during the Great Depression, adopting an approach overlooked in litera-ture.