1,720,967 research outputs found
Was There a Credit Crunch in Namibia Between 1996-2000?
Get PDFCommercial bank credit is a useful tool for promoting economic growth especially at the early stages of development. It has been observed that between 1996 and the early part of 2000, the growth rate of real credit to the private sector declined significantly in Namibia. This period coincided with observed strong demand for commercial bank loans. There has therefore been public discourse on the possibility of a restriction in the supply of credit by commercial banks and hence the occurrence of a credit crunch in the economy since commercial bank lending capacity did not fall. This paper attempts to provide some evidence in this regard by examining the main determinants of commercial bank credit in the economy and ascertaining if credit has been demand or supply constrained. This has been done through a survey of disaggregated data in the banking industry and an estimation of a switching regression model to identify regimes of excess supply and demand. Although it is difficult to determine in the face of obvious demand factors the extent to which the credit slowdown can be attributed to credit supply factors, our results show that supply factors did play a major role.Africa, Namibia, credit crunch, asymmetric information, economic growth
Global financial crisis and trade slowdown in Sub-Sahara Africa: panel VAR analysis for growth and poverty outcomes
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Financing and financial sustainability of microfinance institutions (MFIs): a conceptual view
Get PDFRecent evidence shows that MFI financing continues to evolve with an increased inclination towards commercial financing. Taking stock on MFI financing and refocusing on the relationship between financing options and financial sustainability (FS) is unavoidable. The authors consummated a literature review based on complementing the little evidence on the subject with both theoretical and implied evidence from related studies in unpacking the relationship. Though donations are losing grip as a popular MFI financing option, review of literature recommends smart subsidies to spur FS and counter inefficiency, mis-targetting, dependency and distortions. As much as debt addresses agency problems and endorses FS, it has to be kept within limits to curb liquidation and mission drift. Deposit attraction augments FS and outreach, though MFIs must prepare to foot licensing costs, otherwise, mission drift ensues. Equity, though scarce in microfinance, is cheap and additive to FS. The authors suggest that MFIs should consider commercial funding, whilst keeping a check on the downside of each commercial financing option to augment FS and multiply outreac
Household Over-indebtedness: Understanding its Extent and Characteristics of those Affected
No full textThe threshold effects of household indebtedness on multidimensional poverty
No full textPurposeThe purpose of this paper is to assess the existence of critical tipping points for explanatory variables (age, government grants, education and household size) – in particular, household debt service-to-income on multidimensional poverty.Design/methodology/approachThe paper applies a generalized additive model (GAM) using regression splines on National Income Dynamics Study data to establish threshold effects of the explanatory variables on multidimensional poverty.FindingsThe results show that the tipping point at which debt is associated with improved household welfare is 42.5 percent (level of debt service-to-income). With significant findings, household heads younger than 60 years of age and more children are associated with lower multidimensional poverty. Government grants may suffer from fungibility as they do not seem to be an effective tool for multidimensional poverty eradication. The ideal household size with negative significant correlation to multidimensional poverty is less than four members. And lastly, education proves to be the best instrument for households to escape multidimensional poverty.Social implicationsHigh household indebtedness is a severe social problem. Its effects include deteriorating physical and mental health, relationship difficulties and breakdown. Significant social costs arise such as medical treatment and indirectly, reduction of productivity. Further effects on society include rising criminal behavior, children dropping out of school thereby transferring poverty to succeeding generations. Non-performing loans increase and in turn lead to reduced credit availability. The overall health of the economy is impacted due to reduced aggregate demand.Originality/valueMacro studies have demonstrated the presence of thresholds on debt analyses. However, such is not known in micro analyses, this paper attempts to bridge this knowledge gap by applying GAM for analysis of debt-poverty nexus at the micro level.</jats:sec
Is commercial bank lending in South Africa procyclical?
No full textPurposeThis paper aims to examine the relationship between commercial bank lending and business cycle in South Africa. This paper attempts to know whether commercial bank lending in South Africa is procyclical.Design/methodology/approachThe model assumed that the lending behaviour is related to the business cycle. In this study, vector error correction model (VECM) is used to capture the relationship between bank lending and business cycle to accurately elicit the macroeconomic long-run relationship between business cycle and bank lending, as some banks might slow down bank lending due to some idiosyncratic factors that are not related to the downturn in the economy. This paper uses data from South African Reserve Bank for the period of 1990-2015 using VECM to understand the extent to which business cycle fluctuation can affect credit crunch in the financial system. The Johansen cointegration approach is used to ascertain whether there is indeed a long-run co-movement between credit growth and business cycle.FindingsResults from the VECM show that there are significant linkages among the variables, especially between credit to gross domestic product (GDP) and business cycle. The influence of business cycle is seen vividly after a period of four to five years, where business cycle explains 20 per cent of the variation in the credit to GDP. South African banks tend to change their lending behaviour during upturns and downturns. This result further confirms the assertion in theory that credit follows business cycle and can amplify credit crunch. The result shows that in the long run, fluctuations in the business cycle can influence the credit growth in South Africa.Research limitations/implicationsThe impulse analysis result shows that the impact of business cycle shock is very persistent and lasting. This also demonstrates that the shocks to the business cycle result have a persistent and long-lasting impact on credit. This study finds that commercial bank lending in South Africa is procyclical. It is suggested that the South African economy needs forward-looking policies that will mitigate the flow of credit to the real sector and at the same time ensure financial stability.Originality/valueMost research papers rarely distinguish between the demand side and supply side of credit procyclicality. This report is presented to develop an econometric model that will examine demand side procyclicality. This study adopts more realistic and novel methods that will help in explaining the relationship between bank lending and business cycle in South Africa, especially after the global financial crisis. This report is presented with a concise and detailed analysis and interpretation.</jats:sec
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Identifying the Gap Between the Demand and Supply of Agricultural Finance Among Irrigation Farmers in Namibia
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