We study whether cultural attitudes toward female executives shape the terms of large, primarily
syndicated, corporate loans. Exploiting cross-country variation in negative stereotypes about
women’s managerial ability, we find that firms with female CFOs face higher loan spreads and
receive smaller loans in countries with more negative attitudes, relative to otherwise similar
male-led firms. We analyse different explanations and find that these effects are consistent with
a belief-based assessment of female abilities rooted in broader societal stereotypes, rather than
risk-based explanations. The results are robust to alternative measures of gender-related cultural
attitudes and to a wide range of sample and econometric specifications. Our results provide first
evidence of discrimination against women in the international, mostly syndicated loan market.
