Trade credit remains an important source of finance for firms in developing countries and many firms in developed countries, especially those that are young, small, or informationally opaque for other reasons. This paper summarizes the literature and explains the pervasiveness of trade credit,...

Treating data collected pre- and post-COVID-19 as a quasi-experiment, this paper examines the importance of presumed enablers and safeguards in driving the observed expansion of digital payments and digital financial inclusion. The analysis interacts drivers of digital payment usage with a...

Does related lending have positive or negative effects on the development of banking systems? This paper analyzes a unique cross-country data set covering 74 countries from 1990 to 2007, and finds that related lending, on average, does not have any effect on the growth of credit. The authors do...

This paper combines firm-level data from 89 countries with updated country-level data on financial structure, and uses two estimation approaches. It finds that in low-income countries, labor growth is swifter in countries with a higher level of private credit/gross domestic product; the positive...

A new database of World Bank loans to support financial sector development is used to investigate whether countries that received such loans experienced more rapid growth on standard indicators of financial development than countries that did not. Self-selection is accounted for with...

In recent years, the number of surveys on access to and use of financial services has multiplied, but little is known about whether the data generated are comparable across countries or within the same country over time. A randomized experiment in Ghana tested whether the identity of the...

Evidence based on firm-level data from 89 countries with updated country-level data on financial structure suggests that in low-income countries; labor growth is more rapid in countries with a higher level of private credit/GDP. This positive relationship with private credit is especially...

Foreign bank participation has increased steadily across developing countries since the mid-1990s. This paper documents this trend and surveys the existing literature to explore the drivers and consequences of this phenomenon, paying particular attention to the differences observed across...

Although Kenya's financial system is by far the largest and most developed in East Africa and its stability has improved significantly over the past years, many challenges remain. This paper assesses the stability, efficiency, and outreach of Kenya's banking system, using aggregate, bank-level,...

Regulation allows microfinance institutions to evolve more fully into banks, particularly for institutions aiming to take deposits. But there are potential trade-offs. Complying with regulation and supervision can be costly. The authors examine the implications for the institutions profitability...