ABSTRACT The study investigates the profitability of banks within 41 African countries from the period 2004 to 2013 at different levels of credit information sharing using the depth of credit information index to measure the extent of credit information sharing (i.e. the rules/laws and practice affecting the coverage, scope and accessibility of credit information available either through private bureaus/public registries) in Africa. The extent of credit information sharing is also disaggrega...
ABSTRACT This study examines the joint impact of fiscal and monetary policy shocks on some fundamental macroeconomic indicators in three emerging African economies: Ghana, Nigeria and South Africa. The study uses a vector autoregressive (VAR) method with recursive ordering to explain the relationships between the variables over the years 1970 to 2013. The macroeconomic variables considered include real GDP, Inflation and Trade. Granger causality tests are used to determine the causality beha...
ABSTRACT Few empirical studies have been done on the bank interest rate spread in the context of Africa as a whole. However, these studies failed to explain the possible effects of agency costs on the bank interest rate spread in Africa. This study, therefore, depending on bank-level data on two hundred and ten (210) banks in twenty-eight countries in Africa, and controlling for macroeconomic variables, bank-specific variables, regulatory as well as industry-specific factors, we employed the...
ABSTRACT In recent times, health insurance which seeks to reduce the financial bottlenecks that surrounds access to healthcare has gained much prominence in low-income countries. This may partly be attributed to the observed negative impacts of unanticipated health shocks on poor and vulnerable households in developing countries. A number of African countries in recent years have piloted universal health insurance schemes to provide some basic coverage for all their citizens. However, the imp...
ABSTRACT Earlier studies on the Ghana stock exchange failed to consider the influence of institutional ownership and board committee on the financing decisions of the firms. This study examines the impact of institutional ownership and board committee on capital structure decisions. The study also examines the nature of the corporate board and financing pattern of the firms for the period under investigation. Twenty-nine (29) firms out of the total number of thirty-four (34), on the Ghana St...
ABSTRACT This study set out to examine the effect of sovereign rating on funding cost and profitability of banks in Africa. Using over 300 banks operating in Africa from 2006 to 2012, the study investigates sovereign ratings‟ impact on bank profitability and funding cost. The long term domestic sovereign ratings announced by Fitch and Standard & Poor‟s during the period under study were used. The regressions were estimated using Prais-Winsten and the Generalized Method of Moments estimati...
ABSTRACT This study set out to examine the effect of sovereign rating on funding cost and profitability of banks in Africa. Using over 300 banks operating in Africa from 2006 to 2012, the study investigates sovereign ratings‟ impact on bank profitability and funding cost. The long term domestic sovereign ratings announced by Fitch and Standard & Poor‟s during the period under study were used. The regressions were estimated using Prais-Winsten and the Generalized Method of Moments estimati...
The aim of this study is to investigate the nexus between financial inclusion, financial literacy and inclusive growth in Africa. The study uses a modified version of Sarma (2008) approach to compute an index of financial inclusion and inclusive growth. The system-generalized methods of moments is employed to analyze the link between financial inclusion and inclusive growth. Ordinary Least Squares with robust standard errors is employed to investigate the link between financial literacy ...
This study aimed at finding the effect of financial access and other potential determinants on productivity of firms in Sub-Saharan Africa. Data was sourced from the World Bank‟s Enterprise Survey for 2,830 manufacturing firms collected over the period 2003 – 2014. With the aid of the Semi-parametric approach by Levinsohn and Petrin which uses intermediate inputs to proxy for unobservable productivity shocks, total factor productivity was estimated and regressed on several variables ...
The banking industry plays a crucial role in the economic eco-system and its development means fostered growth for the country. For a financial system to be sound, a vibrant banking system needs to be present. Any shake in the banking system can send a ripple effect to the financial system and it can topple down, causing a recession. The collapse of two Ghanaian banks in 2017 and the consolidation of five other banks a year later raised concerns about the crucial role of risk management ...
As firms go about their operations and expand their activities, the retained earnings of the firm might prove insufficient to support its activities. Firms are forced to look for external finance and the ordeal lies with how to raise the needed funds. A financial contract design for small firms is chosen on the basis of the financial characteristics of the firm, the entrepreneur, the firm’s prospects and the associated information problems (Berger & Udell, 1998). Broadly, these factors...
ABSTRACT This study aimed at evaluating the effects of competition on cost efficiency in the Sub-Saharan African (SSA) banking sector. The study also evaluated how competition affects bank cost efficiency in the various income classifications of countries in SSA. Due to the endogeneity issue between competition and cost efficiency, a two-stage least square method was employed to examine the data of 235 banks from 17 SSA during the period 2006-2012. The results of the study show evidence that ...
ABSTRACT Public Management reforms in public sector accountancy, more specifically, the adoption of accrual basis IPSAS is considered a relevant improvement to the cash basis of accounting since it enables comprehensive reporting on financial transactions of the public sector.This study examines the roles of public sector accountants in the adoption of accrual basis IPSAS in the public sector. Particularly, the study attempts to provide the roles of public sector accountants in the acc...
ABSTRACT The aim of the study was to assess the three-tier pension schemes in Ghana. Specifically, the study examined the standards of the mandatory tier one and tier two pension schemes in Ghana; evaluated the current voluntary tier-three pension scheme in Ghana, and examined the relationship between the benefits of pensions schemes, and an assessment of the three-tier pension scheme to the Ghanaian worker. A cross-sectional survey research strategy, coupled with a quantitative methodologica...
ABSTRACT This research was aimed at assessing the impact of Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWFs) as a transition finance tool on the development of a country. The research had a study population of the 60 largest SWFs in the world in 2014 and used a sample of 34 SWFs in its analysis. The study used secondary data as the main and only source of data, and collected the needed data from secondary sources like the IMF Working Paper Series, FocusEconomics, and Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute (SWFI) among...