In the short term, the countries that will be hit hardest are European ones, which are more dependent on Russian gas, and the poorest ones, which are already struggling to secure the necessary supplies of agricultural commodities and fertilizers.
Small businesses heavily rely on banks for funding, and community banks, those with less than $ billion in assets, account for a disproportionate share of bank lending to small businesses. But across the country, the number of community banks has fallen by half over the past 20 years, mostly due to consolidation.