Access to Financial Services: Measurement, Impact, and Policies (2009)
Beck, Thorsten, Demirgüç-Kunt, Asli, Honohan, Patrick
In many developing countries less than half the population has access to formal financial services, and in most of Africa less than one in five households has access. Lack of access to finance is...
Banking Services for Everyone? Barriers to Bank Access and Use around the World (2008)
Beck, Thorsten, Demirgüç-Kunt, Asli, Martinez Peria, Maria Soledad
Information from 209 banks in 62 countries is used to develop new indicators of barriers to banking services around the world, show their correlation with measures of outreach, and explore their...
Access to Finance: An Unfinished Agenda (2008)
Beck, Thorsten, Demirgüç-Kunt, Asli
Recent data compilations show that many poor and nonpoor people in many developing countries face a high degree of financial exclusion and high barriers in access to finance. Theory and empirical...
Small- and Medium-Size Enterprise Financing in Eastern Europe (2007)
Victor Sulla, Rodrigo Chaves, Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-kunt, Patrick Honohan, Inessa Love
ideas about development issues. An objective of the series is to get the findings out quickly, even if the presentations are less than fully polished. The papers carry the names of the authors and...
Abstract: Deposit insurance schemes and bank failure resolution systems are asked to fulfill conflicting public policy objectives: on the one hand, they are supposed to protect small depositors and...
2003d), “Bank Concentration and Crises (2007)
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-kunt, Ross Levine
Abstract: This paper studies the impact of bank concentration, regulations, and national institutions on the likelihood of suffering a systemic banking crisis. Using data on 79 countries over the...
Law, Politics, and Finance (2007)
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-kunt, Ross Levine
Abstract: This paper assesses three established theories regarding the historical determinants of financial development and also proposes an augmented version of one of these theories. The law and...
2001a, Financial and Legal Constraints to Firm Growth: Does Size Matter? World Bank Mimeo (2007)
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-kunt, Vojislav Maksimovic, George Clarke, Simeon Djankov, Luc Laeven
Abstract: Using a unique firm-level survey data base covering 54 countries, we investigate whether different financial, legal and corruption issues firms report as constraints actually affect their...
Thorsten Beck, Mattias Lundberg, Giovanni Majnoni
Abstract: We extend the recent literature on the link between financial development and economic volatility by focusing on the channels through which financial intermediary development affects...
Determinants of Life Insurance Consumption across Countries (2007)
Thorsten Beck, Ian Webb, Robert Cull, Lisa Gardner, Discussions All
The importance of life insurance companies as part of the financial sector has significantly increased over the last decades, both as provider of important financial services to consumers and as a...
Wink and Karl-Heinz Hillen from the German Bundesbank, Joergen Bang from the (2007)
Thorsten Beck, German Bank Association, Charles Calomiris, Gerard Caprio, Aslı Demirgüç-kunt, Udo Franke, ...
Abstract: This paper describes and evaluates the deposit insurance scheme set up by private commercial banks in Germany in 1975. Unlike schemes in other countries, its funding and management is...
Stock Markets, Banks, and Growth: Correlation or Causality (2007)
Abstract: This paper investigates the impact of stock markets and banks on economic growth using a panel data set for the period 1976-98 and applying recent GMM techniques developed for dynamic...
Sergio Schmukler, Esteban Vesperoni, Simon Altkorn Monti, Thorsten Beck, Simeon Djankov, Jack Glen, ...
This paper investigates whether integration with global markets affects the financing choices of firms from East Asia and Latin America. Using a firm-level panel for the 1980s and 1990s, we study how...
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-kunt, Ross Levine
Abstract: A growing body of work suggests that cross-country differences in legal origin help explain differences in financial development. This paper empirically assesses two theories of why legal...
FINANCING PATTERNS AROUND THE WORLD: THE ROLE OF INSTITUTIONS (2007)
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-kunt, Vojislav Maksimovic
Abstract: Using a firm-level survey database covering 48 countries, this paper investigates whether differences in financial and le gal development affect the way firms finance their investment. Our...
This paper describes the law and finance theory along with skeptical and competing views and reviews empirical evidence on both parts of the law and finance view. World Bank Policy Research Working...
Law, Endowments, and Finance (2007)
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-kunt, Ross Levine
This paper assesses two theories regarding the historical determinants of international differences in financial development. The law and finance theory holds that legal traditions differ in terms of...
SMEs, Growth and Poverty: Crosscountry Evidence (2005)
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-kunt, Ross Levine, Maria Carkovic, George Clarke, Simeon Djankov, ...
Abstract: This paper explores the relationship between the relative size of the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) sector, economic growth, and poverty alleviation using a new database on the share of...
Legal Institutions and Financial Development (2005)
A burgeoning literature finds that financial development exerts a first-order impact on long-run economic growth. Levine and Zervos (1998) show that banking and stock market development are good...
SMEs, Growth, and Poverty: (2005)
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-kunt, Ross Levine
This paper explores the relationship between the relative size of the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) sector, economic growth, and poverty using a new database on the share of SME labor in the...
Bank Competition and Access to Finance: International Evidence (2004)
Journal of Money, Credit, and Banking - Volume 36, Number 3 (Part 2), June 2004
2004) “Stock markets, banks, and growth: panel evidence (2003)
Abstract: This paper investigates the impact of stock markets and banks on economic growth using a panel data set for the period 1976-98 and applying recent GMM techniques developed for dynamic...
Small and Medium Enterprises across the Globe: A New Database.” World Bank mimeo (2003)
Meghana Ayyagari, Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-kunt
Abstract: This paper describes a new cross-country database on the importance of Small and Medium Enterprises (SME). This database is unique in that it presents consistent and comparable information...
Governance and bank valuation (2003)
Gerard Caprio, Luc Laeven, Ross Levine, Thorsten Beck, George Benston, Sugato Bhattacharyya, ...
Which public policies and ownership structures enhance the governance of banks? This paper constructs a new database on the ownership of banks internationally and then assesses the ramifications of...
Small and Medium Enterprises across the Globe: A New Database.” World Bank mimeo (2003)
Meghana Ayyagari, Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-kunt
This paper describes a new cross-country database on the importance of Small and Medium Enterprises (SME). This database is unique in that it presents consistent and comparable information on the...
Life insurance has become an increasingly important part of the financial sector over the past 40 years, providing a range of financial services for consumers and becoming a major source of...
Kühlschmierstoffeinsatz beim Schleifen mit CBN / (2002)
Zugl.: Aachen, Techn. Hochsch., Diss., 2001.
Industry Growth and Capital Allocation: Does Having a Market- or Bank-Based System Matter (2002)
Thorsten Beck, Ross Levine, Jel Classification, Nicola Cetorelli, Robert Cull, Patrick Honohan, ...
Abstract: Are market-based or bank-based financial systems better at financing the expansion of industries that depend heavily on external finance, facilitating the formation of new establishments,...
Financial Development and International Trade: Is There a Link (2002)
This paper explores a possible link between financial development and trade in manufactures. The theoretical model focuses on the role of financial intermediaries in facilitating large-scale,...
Legal Theories of Financial Development (2001)
Beck, Thorsten, Demirgüç-Kunt, Asli, Levine, Ross
This paper examines legal theories of international differences in financial development. The law and finance theory stresses that legal traditions differ in terms of (i) their emphasis on the rights...
New Tools in Comparative Political Economy: The Database of Political Institutions (2001)
Beck, Thorsten, Clarke, George, Groff, Alberto, Keefer, Philip, Walsh, Patrick
This article introduces a large new cross‐country database, the Database of Political Institutions. It covers 177 countries over 21 years, 1975–95. The article presents the intuition,...
Financial Intermediation and Growth: Causality and Causes (2000)
Ross Levine, Norman Loayza, Thorsten Beck
This paper evaluates (1) whether the exogenous component of financial intermediary development influences economic growth and (2) whether cross-country differences in legal and accounting systems...
New Tools and New Tests in Comparative Political Economy: The Database of (2000)
Thorsten Beck, George Clarke, Alberto Groff, Philip Keefer, Patrick Walsh
This paper’s findings, interpretations, and conclusions are entirely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs, or the World Bank,...
Thorsten Beck, Ross Levine, Jel Classification
Abstract: Are market-based or bank-based financial systems better at financing industries that depend heavily on external finance? Are market- or bank-based financial systems better at facilitating...
A New Database on the Structure and Development of the Financial Sector (2000)
Beck, Thorsten, Demirgüç-Kunt, Asli, Levine, Ross
This article introduces a new database of indicators of financial structure and financial development across countries and over time. The database is unique in that it combines a wide variety of...
A new database on financial development and structure (1999)
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-kunt, Ross Levine
Abstract: This paper introduces a new database of indicators of financial development and structure across countries and over time. This database is unique in that it unites a wide variety of...
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Ross Levine
This paper explores the relationship between the relative size of the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) sector, economic growth, and poverty alleviation using a new database on the share of SME labor...
Legal Theories of Financial Development
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-Kunt, Ross Levine
This paper examines legal theories of international differences in financial development. The law and finance theory stresses that legal traditions differ in terms of (i) their emphasis on the rights...
Law and Firms' Access to Finance
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt
This article examines how a country's legal origin influences the operation of its financial system by using firm-level survey data across a broad cross-section of countries on the obstacles that...
Deposit insurance as private club - Is Germany a model?
The author describes, and evaluates the deposit insurance scheme set-up by private commercial banks in Germany in 1975. The scheme's funding, and management are completely private, with no pubic...
The determinants of financing obstacles
Thorsten Beck, Luc Laeven, Vojislav Maksimovic
The authors use survey data on a sample of over 10,000 firms from 80 countries to assess (1) how successful a priori classifications are in distinguishing between financially constrained and...
Finance, Inequality, and Poverty: Cross-Country Evidence
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Ross Levine
While substantial research finds that financial development boosts overall economic growth, we study whether financial development disproportionately raises the incomes of the poor and alleviates...
Finance, Firm Size, and Growth
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Luc Laeven, Ross Levine
This paper examines whether financial development boosts the growth of small firms more than large firms and hence provides information on the mechanisms through which financial development fosters...
Finance and the sources of growth
Beck, Thorsten, Levine, Ross, Loayza, Norman
The authors evaluate whether the level of development in the banking sector exerts a causal impact on economic growth and its sources-total factor productivity growth, physical capital accumulation,...
Law and finance : why does legal origin matter?
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Levine, Ross
A growing body of work suggests that cross-country differences in legal origin help explain differences in financial development. The authors assess two theories of why legal origin influences...
Bank competition, financing obstacles, and access to credit
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kant, Asl', Maksimovic, Vojislav
Theory makes ambiguous predictions about the effects of bank concentration on access to external finance. Using a unique data base for 74 countries offinancing obstacles and financing patterns for...
Deposit insurance schemes and bank failure resolution systems are asked to fulfill conflicting public policy objectives: on the one hand, they are supposed to protect small depositors and prevent...
Small and medium enterprises across the globe : a new database
Ayyagari, Meghana, Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asl
This paper describes a new cross-country database on the importance of small and medium enterprises (SMEs). This database is unique in that it presents consistent and comparable information on the...
Law and firms'access to finance
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Levine, Ross
Why does a country's legal origin influence its firms'access to finance? Using data from over 4,000 firms in 38 countries, the authors show that firms in countries with French legal origin face...
Finance, inequality, and poverty: cross-country evidence
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Levine, Ross
While substantial research finds that financial development boosts overall economic growth, the authors study whether financial development is pro-poor: Does financial development disproportionately...
Financial structure and economic development - firm, industry, and country evidence
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Levine, Ross, Maksimovic, Vojislav
The authors explore the relationship between financial structure - the degree to which a financial system is market- or bank-based - and economicdevelopment. They use three methodologies: 1) The...
Financial and legal institutions and firm size
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Maksimovic, Vojislav
The authors investigate how a country's financial institutions and the quality of its legal system explain the size attained by its largest industrial firms in a sample of 44 countries. Firm size is...
Small and medium enterprises, growth, and poverty : cross-country evidence
The authors explore the relationship between the relative size of the small and medium enterprise (SME) sector, economic growth, and poverty using a new database on the share of SME labor in the...
Bank privatization and performance - emprical evidence from Nigeria
Beck, Thorsten, Cull, Robert, Jerome, Afeikhena
The authors assess the effect of privatization on performance in a panel of Nigerian banks for the period 1990-2001. They find evidence of performance improvement in nine banks that were privatized,...
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Levine, Ross
The authors assess three established theories about the historical determinants of financial development. They also propose an augmented version of one of these theories. The law and finance view,...
Financial dependence and international trade
Does financial development translate into a comparative advantage in industries that use more external finance? The author uses industry-level data on firms'dependence on external finance for 36...
Bank supervision and corporate finance
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Levine, Ross
The authors examine the impact of bank supervision on the financing obstacles faced by almost 5,000 corporations across 49 countries. They find that firms in countries with strong official...
Structural issues in the Kenyan financial system: improving competition and access
Beck, Thorsten, Fuchs, Michael
Although by regional standards, Kenya's financial system is relatively well developed and diversified, major structural impediments prevent it from reaching its full potential. Crosscountry...
New tools and new tests in comparative political economy - the database of political institutions
Beck, Thorsten, Clarke, George, Groff, Alberto, Keefer, Philip, Walsh, Patrick
This paper introduces a large new cross-country database on political institutions: the Database on Political Institutions (DPI). The authors summarize key variables (many of them new), compare this...
Financial development and international trade : is there a link?
The author explores a possible link between financial development and trade in manufactures. His theoretical model focuses on the role of financial intermediaries in facilitating large-scale,...
Financing patterns around the world : the role of institutions
Beck, Thorsten, Asl Demirguc-Kunt, Maksimovic, Vojislav
Using a firm-level survey database covering 48 countries, the authors investigate whether differences in financial and legal development affect the way firms finance their investments. The results...
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Levine, Ross
The authors study the impact of bank concentration, regulations, and national institutions on the likelihood of suffering a systemic banking crisis. Using data on 79 countries over the period...
Bank Competition and Access to Finance: International Evidence.
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Maksimovic, Vojislav
Using a unique database for 74 countries and for firms of small, medium, and large size we assess the effect of banking market structure on the access of firms to bank finance. We find that bank...
The determinants of financing obstacles
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Laeven, Luc, Maksimovic, Vojislav
Institution Building and Growth in Transition Economies
Drawing on the recent literature on economic institutions and the origins of economic development, we offer a political economy explanation of why institution building has varied so much across...
Institution building and growth in transition economies
Transition economies, Institutions, Economic development, O10, P20,
Bank efficiency, ownership, and market structure : why are interest spreads so high in Uganda ?
Using a unique bank-level data set on the Ugandan banking system during 1999-2005, the authors explore the factors behind consistently high interest rate spreads and margins. While foreign banks...
The basic analytics of access to financial services
Beck, Thorsten, De La Torre, Augusto
Access to financial services, or rather the lack thereof, is often indiscriminately decried as a problem in many developing countries. The authors argue that the"problem of access"should rather be...
Bank Efficiency, Ownership and Market Structure
Using a unique bank-level dataset on the Ugandan banking system over the period 1999 to 2005, we explore the factors behind consistently high interest rate spreads and margins. While foreign banks...
Financial Intermediation and Growth: Causality and Causes
Thorsten Beck, Ross Levine, Norman Loayza
This paper evaluates (1) whether the exogenous component of financial intermediary development influences economic growth and (2) whether cross-country differences in legal and accounting systems...
Finance, inequality and the poor
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-Kunt, Ross Levine
Financial development disproportionately boosts incomes of the poorest quintile and reduces income inequality. About 40% of the long-run impact of financial development on the income growth of the...
Big Bad Banks? The Impact of U.S. Branch Deregulation on Income Distribution
Thorsten Beck, Ross Levine, Alexey Levkov
Policymakers and economists disagree about the impact of bank regulations on the distribution of income. Exploiting cross-state and cross-time variation, we test whether liberalizing restrictions on...
Big bad banks ? the impact of U.S. branch deregulation on income distribution
Beck, Thorsten, Levine, Ross, Levkov, Alexey
Policymakers and economists disagree about the impact of bank regulations on the distribution of income. Exploiting cross-state and cross-time variation, the authors test whether liberalizing...
Law and Finance: why Does Legal Origin Matter?
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Ross Levine
New research suggests that cross-country differences in legal origin help explain differences in financial development. This paper empirically assesses two theories of why legal origin influences...
Financial intermediation and growth : Causality and causes
Levine, Ross, Loayza, Norman, Beck, Thorsten
The authors evaluate: a) whether the level of development of financial intermediaries exerts a casual influence on economic growth; and b) whether cross-country differences in legal and accounting...
A new database on financial development and structure
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Levine, Ross
The authors introduce a new database of indicators of financial development and structure across countries and over time. This database is unique in that it unites a variety of indicators that...
Impediments to the development and efficiency of financial intermediation in Brazil
Reforms to improve both the level and the efficiency of financial inter-mediation in Brazil should be high on Brazilian policymakers'agendas, because of the financial sector's importance to economic...
New firm formation and industry growth - does having a market- or bank-based system matter?
The authors find no evidence for the superiority of either market-based or bank-based financial systems for industries dependent on external financing. But they find overwhelming evidence that...
Stock markets, banks, and growth : correlation or causality?
The authors investigate the impact of stock markets and banks on economic growth using a panel data set for 1976-98 and applying recent generalized method of moments (GMM) techniques developed for...
Financial and legal constraints to firm growth - Does size matter?
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Maksimovic, Vojislav
Using a unique firm-level survey data base, covering fifty four countries, the authors investigate whether different financial, legal, and corruptionissues that firms report as constraints, actually...
Determinants of life insurance consumption across countries
The importance of life insurance companies as part of the financial sector has significantly increased over the past decades, both as provider of important financial services to consumers and as a...
Legal institutions and financial development
A burgeoning literature finds that financial development exerts a first-order impact on long-run economic growth, which raises critical questions, such as why do some countries have well-developed...
Finance, firm size, and growth
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Laeven, Luc, Levine, Ross
The authors examine whether financial development boosts the growth of small firms more than large firms and hence provides information on the mechanisms through which financial development fosters...
State bank transformation in Brazil - choices and consequences
Beck, Thorsten, Crivelli, Juan Miguel, Summerhill, William
The authors analyze the different options-liquidation, federalization, privatization, and restructuring-that the Brazilian state government had for the transformation of state banks under the...
Institution building and growth in transition economies
Drawing on the recent literature on economic institutions and the origins of economic development, the authors offer a political economy explanation of why institution building has varied so much...
Reaching out : access to and use of banking services across countries
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Martinez Peria, Maria Soledad
The authors (1) present new indicators of banking sector penetration across 99 countries based on a survey of bank regulatory authorities, (2) show that these indicators predict household and firm...
Creating an efficient financial system : challenges in a global economy
Financial sector development fosters economic growth and reduces poverty by widening and broadening access to finance and allocating society's savings more efficiently. The author first discusses...
Resolution of failed banks by deposit insurers : cross-country evidence
There is a wide cross-country variation in the institutional structure of bank failure resolution, including the role of the deposit insurer. The authors use quantitative analysis for 57 countries...
Creating a more efficient financial system : challenges for Bangladesh
Beck, Thorsten, Rahman, Md. Habibur
While Bangladesh has embarked on a path to reform its financial system, most prominently by privatizing its government-owned banks, the Nationalized Commercial Banks (NCBs), a sustainable long-term...
Banking services for everyone ? Barriers to bank access and use around the world
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Martinez Peria, Maria Soledad
Using information from 193 banks in 58 countries, the authors develop and analyze indicators of physical access, affordability, and eligibility barriers to deposit, loan, and payment services. They...
Financial and Legal Constraints to Growth: Does Firm Size Matter?
THORSTEN BECK, ASLI DEMIRGÜÇ-KUNT, VOJISLAV MAKSIMOVIC
Using a unique firm-level survey database covering 54 countries, we investigate the effect of financial, legal, and corruption problems on firms' growth rates. Whether these factors constrain growth...
Foreign bank acquisitions and outreach : evidence from Mexico
Beck, Thorsten, Soledad Martinez Peria, Maria
Recently, developing countries have witnessed a sharp increase in foreign bank participation. The authors examine the impact on banking outreach using newly gathered data for Mexico, where foreign...
Small and Medium Enterprises Across the Globe
Meghana Ayyagari, Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt
Small and Medium Enterprises, L11, L25, L26, O17,
Bank competition and access to finance: international evidence
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-Kunt, Vojislav Maksimovic
Using a unique database for 74 countries and for firms of small, medium, and large size we assess the effect of banking market structure on the access of firms to bank finance. We find that bank...
Reaching out: Access to and use of banking services across countries
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Martinez Peria, Maria Soledad
Financial Dependence and International Trade
Does financial development translate into a comparative advantage in industries that use more external finance? The author uses industry-level data on firms' dependence on external finance for 36...
SMEs, Growth, and Poverty: Cross-Country Evidence
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Ross Levine
Firm size, market structure, economic development, O1, O2, L11, L25,
Economic, Demographic, and Institutional Determinants of Life Insurance Consumption across Countries
Life insurance has become an increasingly important part of the financial sector over the past 40 years, providing a range of financial services for consumers and becoming a major source of...
Finance, Firm Size, and Growth
THORSTEN BECK, ASLI DEMIRGUC-KUNT, LUC LAEVEN, ROSS LEVINE
Although research shows that financial development accelerates aggregate economic growth, economists have not resolved conflicting theoretical predictions and ongoing policy disputes about the...
The econometrics of finance and growth
This paper reviews different econometric methodologies to assess the relationship between financial development and growth. It illustrates the identification problem, which is at the center of the...
Benchmarking financial development
Beck, Thorsten, Feyen, Erik, Ize, Alain, Moizeszowicz, Florencia
Capitalizing on recent improvements in the availability of cross-country financial sector data, this paper proposes a standard methodology for benchmarking the policy component of financial...
Bank competition and financial stability : friends or foes ?
Theory makes ambiguous predictions about the relationship between market structure and competitiveness of the banking system and banking sector stability. Empirical studies focusing on individual...
Who gets the credit ? and does it matter ? household vs. firm lending across countries
Beck, Thorsten, Buyukkarabacak, Berrak, Rioja, Felix, Valev, Neven
While the theoretical and empirical finance literature has focused almost exclusively on enterprise credit, about half of credit extended by banks to the private sector in a sample of 45 developing...
Industry Growth and Capital Allocation: Does Having a Market- or Bank-Based System Matter?
Are market-based or bank-based financial systems better at financing the expansion of industries that depend heavily on external finance, facilitating the formation of new establishments, and...
Stock Markets, Banks, and Growth: Panel Evidence
This paper investigates the impact of stock markets and banks on economic growth using a panel data set for the period 1976-98 and applying recent GMM techniques developed for dynamic panels. On...
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Ross Levine
This paper assesses two theories regarding the historical determinants of international differences in financial development. The law and finance theory holds that legal traditions differ in terms of...
Bank Supervision and Corporate Finance
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Ross Levine
We examine the impact of bank supervision on the financing obstacles faced by almost 5,000 corporations across 49 countries. We find that firms in countries with strong official supervisory agencies...
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Ross Levine
Motivated by public policy debates about bank consolidation and conflicting theoretical predictions about the relationship between the market structure of the banking industry and bank fragility,...
Legal Institutions and Financial Development
This paper provides a concise, selective review of research on the role of legal institutions in shaping the operation of financial systems. While a burgeoning literature finds that financial...
Legal Institutions and Financial Development
Why do some countries have growth-enhancing financial systems, while others do not? Why have some countries developed the necessary investor protection laws and contract-enforcement mechanisms to...
Law and Firms' Access to Finance
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Ross Levine
This paper contributes to the literature on how a country's legal origin influences the operation of its financial system by using firm-level survey data on the obstacles that firms face in raising...
Bank Supervision and Corruption in Lending
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Ross Levine
Which commercial bank supervisory policies ease or intensify the degree to which bank corruption is an obstacle to firms raising external finance? Based on new data from more than 2,500 firms across...
Bank Concentration and Fragility: Impact and Mechanics
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Ross Levine
Public policy debates and theoretical disputes motivate this paper%u2019s examination of (i) the relationship between bank concentration and banking system fragility and (ii) the mechanisms...
The typology of partial credit guarantee funds around the world
Beck, Thorsten, Klapper, Leora F., Mendoza, Juan Carlos
This paper presents data on 76 partial credit guarantee schemes across 46 developed and developing countries. Based on theory, the authors discuss different organizational features of credit...
Special issue: Banking and bank regulation: Challenges for the future
Beck, Thorsten, Laeven, Luc, Levine, Ross, Pennacchi, George
Financing patterns around the world: Are small firms different?
Beck, Thorsten, Demirgüç-Kunt, Asli, Maksimovic, Vojislav
Using a firm-level survey database covering 48 countries, we investigate how financial and institutional development affects financing of large and small firms. Our database is not limited to large...
Why are interest spreads so high in Uganda?
Using international comparisons and a unique bank-level dataset on the Ugandan banking system over the period 1999 to 2005, we explore the factors behind consistently high interest rate spreads and...
Bank Financing for SMEs around the World: Drivers, Obstacles, Business Models, and Lending Practices
Beck, Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Soledad Martinez Peria, Maria
Using data from a survey of 91 banks in 45 countries, the authors characterize bank financing to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) around the world. They find that banks perceive the SME segment to...
Luc Laeven, Anonymous Referees, Thorsten Beck, Jerry Caprio, Stijn Claessens, Asli Demirg-kunt
Arguing that a relatively high cost of deposit insurance indicates that a bank takes excessive risks, this article estimates the cost of deposit insurance for a large sample of banks in 14 economies...
Economic, Demographic, and Institutional Determinants of Life Insurance Consumption across Countries
Life insurance has become an increasingly important part of the financial sector over the past 40 years, providing a range of financial services for consumers and becoming a major source of...
Access to Financial Services: Measurement, Impact, and Policies
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-Kunt, Patrick Honohan
In many developing countries less than half the population has access to formal financial services, and in most of Africa less than one in five households has access. Lack of access to finance is...
Financial institutions and markets across countries and over time - data and analysis
Beck , Thorsten, Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Levine, Ross
This paper introduces the updated and expanded version of the Financial Development and Structure Database and presents recent trends in structure and development of financial institutions and...
Gender and Banking: Are Women Better Loan Officers?
Beck, Thorsten, Behr, Patrick, Güttler, Andre
We analyze gender differences associated with loan officer performance. Using a unique data set for a commercial bank in Albania over the period 1996 to 2006, we find that loans screened and...
Who Gets the Credit? And Does It Matter? Household vs. Firm Lending across Countries
Beck, Thorsten, Büyükkarabacak, Berrak, Rioja, Felix, Valev, Neven
While theory predicts different effects of household credit and enterprise credit on the economy, the empirical literature has mainly used aggregate measures of overall bank lending to the private...
Stock markets, banks, and economic development:theory and evidence
This paper discusses the different functions that capital markets and banks have in economic development, and it reviews the debate about marketbased vs. bank-based financial systems. Using data for...
Finance in Africa - Achievements and Challenges
Beck, Thorsten, Fuchs, Michael, Uy, Marilou
In spite of shallow financial markets, Sub-Saharan Africa will not escape the repercussions of the global financial crisis. The global turmoil threatens the progress Sub-Saharan Africa has made in...
SMEs, growth, and poverty: Cross-Country Evidence
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-Kunt, Ross Levine
Citation: Thorsten Beck; Asli Demirgüç-Kunt ; Ross Levine, "SMEs, growth, and poverty: Cross-Country Evidence", hdl:1902.1/12886
Access to Finance: An Unfinished Agenda
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-Kunt
Recent data compilations show that many poor and nonpoor people in many developing countries face a high degree of financial exclusion and high barriers in access to finance. Theory and empirical...
Banking Services for Everyone? Barriers to Bank Access and Use around the World
Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-Kunt
Information from 209 banks in 62 countries is used to develop new indicators of barriers to banking services around the world, show their correlation with measures of outreach, and explore their...
What explains the cost of remittances ? an examination across 119 country corridors
Beck, Thorsten, Peria, Maria Soledad Martinez
Remittances are a sizeable source of external financing for developing countries. In the L’Aquila 2009 G8 Summit, leaders pledged to reduce the cost of remittances by half in 5 years (from 10 to 5...