Using firm-level surveys for up to 73 countries, this paper explores the impact of introducing collateral registries for movable assets on firms'access to bank finance. It compares firms'access to bank finance in seven countries that introduced collateral registries for movable assets against...

Mobile banking services offer great potential to expand financial services, particularly payment services, to the poor. They also provide a convenient and cost effective way to access bank accounts. This paper constitutes a first attempt to explain statistically what factors contribute to mobile...

This paper analyzes the impact of introducing credit information-sharing systems on firms'access to finance. The analysis uses multi-year, firm-level surveys for 63 countries covering more than 75,000 firms over the period 2002-13. The results reveal that credit bureau reforms, but not credit...

Is it the institutions or firm characteristics at birth that shape startups and their early growth in developing countries? Using comprehensive data from the Indian Annual Survey of Industries this paper addresses this question by studying the early lifecycle of firms across diverse...

This paper reviews and synthesizes theoretical and empirical research on the role of finance in developing countries. First, the paper presents the stylized facts about firms in developing nations as well as the legal, financial and broader institutional framework in which these firms operate....

Survey data from 120 developing countries are used to examine the relation between establishment size and age in the formal sector. Existing research suggests that manufacturing establishments in developing countries do not grow over time, most likely because of market imperfections and...

The differences in financial development across Indian states, while seeming substantial, have a minor effect on firm lifecycle and growth. These results hold controlling for differences in labor regulations across states, capital intensity, and for firms born before and after the major reforms....

China is often mentioned as a counterexample to the findings in the finance and growth literature since, despite the weaknesses in its banking system, it is one of the fastest growing economies in the world. The fast growth of Chinese private sector firms is taken as evidence that it is...

The author examines the effect of legal bonding on ownership and control structures of foreign firms cross-listing in the United States. Contrary to the predictions of corporate governance convergence theories, there is little evidence of convergence-related migration to a dispersed ownership...

This paper investigates corruption and tax evasion and their firm-level determinants across 25,000 firms in 57 countries, a large fraction of which are small and medium enterprises in developing countries. Firms that pay more bribes also evade more taxes. Corruption acts as a tax oninnovation,...