I study the link between ethnic diversity, democracy, and corruption. In a static model, I show that contrary to conventional wisdom, corruption might emerge as a negative externality of democracy. This occurs through ethnicity, which appears as a rent-extracting technology in a democratic...

This 2013 Article IV Consultation highlights that high oil prices and increased production have enabled the government in Kuwait to continue to record high fiscal and external surpluses and build strong buffers. Overall real non-oil GDP growth is projected to increase modestly to 3 percent in...

This paper presents key discussions of Cameroon’s 2013 Article IV Consultation. Economic activity in Cameroon has continued to recover gradually from the global financial crisis in 2008–2009, and inflation has remained subdued. In light of growing vulnerabilities, the report...

We develop a micro-founded general equilibrium model with heterogeneous agents to identify pertinent constraints to financial inclusion. We evaluate quantitatively the policy impacts of relaxing each of these constraints separately, and in combination, on GDP and inequality. We focus on three...

The paper analyses existing country-level information on the relationship between the development of Islamic banking and financial inclusion. In Muslim countries—members of the Organization for Islamic Cooperation (OIC)—various indicators of financial inclusion tend to be lower,...

This paper discusses the findings of the assessments on Basel Core Principles for Effective Banking Supervision in India. The Reserve Bank of India is to be commended for its tightly controlled regulatory and supervisory regime, consisting of higher than minimum capital requirements; frequent,...

Under Article IV of the IMF’s Articles of Agreement, the IMF holds bilateral discussions with members, usually every year. In the context of the 2012 Article IV consultation with Zimbabwe, the following documents have been released and are included in this package

This paper leverages the IMF’s Financial Access Survey (FAS) database to construct a new composite index of financial inclusion. The topic of financial inclusion has gathered significant attention in recent years. Various initiatives have been undertaken by central banks both in advanced...

In the wake of the recent global crisis the international community is giving an increased focus on stability of the financial system, so-called financial stability analysis. With the increasing need for data sets to undertake this analysis, the question naturally arises as to what types of data...

Financial inclusion has been one of the key pillars of Colombia’s development strategy for a number of years. Financial inclusion policies have aimed at channeling microcredit to poor, spreading formal banking system usage, fostering electronic payment acceptance, and making financial...