Using household surveys and bank penetration data at the district-level in 2006 and 2009, this paper examines the impact of Equity Bank-a leading private commercial bank focusing on microfinance-on access to banking in Kenya. Unlike other commercial banks in Kenya, Equity Bank pursues distinct...

This paper investigates the African financial development and financial inclusion gaps relative to other peer developing countries. The paper uses a set of variables related to financial development and inclusion. It first estimates the gaps between African countries and other developing...

We provide a comprehensive review of China's financial system, and explore directions of future development. First, the financial system has been dominated by a large banking sector. In recent years banks have made considerable progress in reducing the amount of non-performing loans and...

Using household surveys and bank penetration data at the district-level in 2006 and 2009, we explore the impact of Equity Bank — a leading private commercial bank focusing on microfinance on the access to banking in Kenya. Equity Bank pursues distinct branching and business strategies that...

The spectacular economic growth in China during the past four decades has inspired a great deal of research to understand China's unconventional growth path. This review focuses on recent developments in China's institutions, financial markets, innovations, and government–business relations in...

We re-examine the state sector and its role in the Chinese economy by using the information on the ownership networks of 40 million firms for 1990-2017. We propose a new measure of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and partial SOEs based on the firm-to-firm equity investment relationships. Our...

Implicit guarantees provided by financial intermediaries are important in China. We argue theoretically that project screening by financial intermediaries, accompanied by their implicit guarantees to investors, can be the second-best arrangement. It can also mitigate capital misallocation that...