Covid Impact Analysis on Small and Medium Sized French Enterprises

Small and Medium-sized enterprises (SME) are the backbone of the economy of developed countries. Given their importance to the economy, it is necessary to analyze and study the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on their activities. Hence, this research evaluates the impact of the Covid-19 outbreak on the French SMEs ecosystem. We analyze the impact on the default percentage of several different economic sectors. We focus our analysis on 4 different sectors: Wholesale & retail trade, repair of motor vehicles; Construction; Manufacturing; Accommodation and food service activities. We found that the default percentage evolution is similar across the studied sectors. Furthermore, we conclude that the limited impact of Covid-19 on French SMEs can be explained by the solidarity fund implemented by the French government to reduce the economic impact of the pandemic.