Policymakers and economists disagree about the impact of bank regulations on the distribution of income. Exploiting cross-state and cross-time variation, the authors test whether liberalizing restrictions on intra-state branching in the United States intensified, ameliorated, or had no effect on...

Using information from 193 banks in 58 countries, the authors develop and analyze indicators of physical access, affordability, and eligibility barriers to deposit, loan, and payment services. They find substantial cross-country variation in barriers to banking and show that in many countries...

Using a unique bank-level data set on the Ugandan banking system during 1999-2005, the authors explore the factors behind consistently high interest rate spreads and margins. While foreign banks charge lower interest rate spreads, they do not find a robust and economically significant...

Access to financial services, or rather the lack thereof, is often indiscriminately decried as a problem in many developing countries. The authors argue that the problem of access should rather be analyzed by identifying different demand and supply constraints. They use the concept of an access...

While Bangladesh has embarked on a path to reform its financial system, most prominently by privatizing its government-owned banks, the Nationalized Commercial Banks (NCBs), a sustainable long-term expansion of the financial system requires a more substantial change in the role of government....

There is a wide cross-country variation in the institutional structure of bank failure resolution, including the role of the deposit insurer. The authors use quantitative analysis for 57 countries and discuss specific country cases to illustrate this variation. Using data for over 1,700 banks...

This paper uses cross-country firm-level surveys to gauge access to financial services and the importance of financing constraints for African enterprises. The paper compares access to finance in Africa and other developing regions of the world, within Africa across countries, and across...

This paper presents new data on the depth and penetration of mortgage markets across countries. There is a large variation across both dimensions of mortgage market development, across countries, but also -- in terms of depth -- within countries. Mortgage markets seem to develop only at...

This paper takes stock of the current state of banking systems across Sub-Saharan Africa and discusses recent developments including innovations that might help Africa leapfrog more traditional banking models. Using an array of different data, the paper documents that African banking systems are...

Across the world, supply for financial services rarely matches the demand, given multiple market frictions. This paper discusses the concept of the financial possibilities frontier as a constrained optimum to categorize different problems of shallow financial markets or unsustainable expansion....