How do borrowers respond to improvements in a lender's ability to punish defaulters? This paper reports the results of a randomized field experiment in rural Malawi that examines the impact of fingerprinting borrowers in a context where a unique identification system is absent. Fingerprinting...

This paper reports the results of a field experiment that randomly assigned smallholder cash crop farmers formal savings accounts. In collaboration with a microfinance institution in Malawi, the authors tested two primary treatments, offering either: 1) "ordinary" accounts, or 2) both ordinary...

We report the results of a randomized field experiment that examines the credit market impacts of improvements in a lender's ability to determine borrowers' identities. Improved personal identification enhances the credibility of a lender's dynamic repayment incentives by allowing it to withhold...