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This paper aims to examine the role of institutional framework of regulative, normative, and cultural-cognitive in promoting financial literacy by microfinance deposit-taking institutions in developing economies with a specific focus on rural Uganda.

Data were collected from a total sample of 400 respondents who are clients of promotion of rural initiatives development enterprises microfinance deposit-taking institution using a questionnaire and analysis of moment structures (AMOS) was adopted to analyze the data to examine the role of institutional framework of regulative, normative, and cultural-cognitive in promoting financial literacy by microfinance deposit-taking institutions in developing economies with a specific focus on rural Uganda.

The results indicated that institutional framework of regulative, normative, and cultural-cognitive significantly and positively promotes financial literacy by microfinance deposit-taking institutions in developing economies, especially in rural Uganda. The existence of institutional framework of regulative (codified rules and laws), normative (shared beliefs/values and norms), and cultural-cognitive (shared conception and interpretation) promotes financial literacy by microfinance deposit-taking institutions in rural Uganda. The structural equation model constructed by use of AMOS revealed that the institutional framework of regulative, normative, and cultural-cognitive explains 27 per cent of the variation on the role of microfinance deposit-taking institutions in promoting financial literacy in rural Uganda.

This study was purely cross-sectional with data collected at a specific point in time. Therefore, future studies through longitudinal research design can be adopted to test for the hypotheses derived under this study. In addition, only quantitative data collected by use of a semi-structured questionnaire was used in this study. Further studies may consider the use of interviews to get in-depth responses from the respondents.

Advocates of financial literacy programs in developing economies should consider the existence of institutional framework of regulative, normative, and cultural-cognitive, which helps in promoting financial literacy by microfinance deposit-taking institutions. Indeed, the existence of state legislation to teach people about how to manage their money can promote financial literacy. Besides, normative behavior among individuals within a social setting can lead to increased likelihood that they will engage and participate in a particular financial literacy drive. Correspondingly, cognition, especially fluid intelligence that changes as people age may also help individuals to invoke several dimensions of cognitive skills to make informed financial decisions.

The current study adds to the existing body of knowledge by examining the role of institutional framework of regulative, normative, and cultural-cognitive in promoting financial literacy by microfinance deposit-taking institutions in developing economies. There is deficiency in the link between the institutional framework under the theory of institutions and financial literacy, especially in developing economies where there is great need for financial literacy among the poor.

The purpose of this paper is to establish the relationship between institutional framework of regulative (formal rules), normative (informal norms) and cultural-cognitive (cognition), and their effects on financial intermediation by microfinance deposit taking institutions (MDIs) in developing economies like Uganda.

Data collected from a total sample of 400 poor households and 40 relationship officers located in rural Uganda were processed using statistical package for social sciences and analysis of moment structures to establish the relationship between institutional framework of regulative, normative and cultural-cognitive, and their effects on financial intermediation by MDIs in developing economies.

The results showed that the three dimensions of regulative (formal rules), normative (informal norms) and cultural-cognitive (cognition) significantly affect financial intermediation by MDIs in developing economies like Uganda. In addition, as a unique finding, two new dimensions of procedural and declarative cognition emerged from cultural-cognitive framework to determine financial intermediation among MDIs in developing economies, specifically in Uganda.

The study collected data from only poor households and relationship officers located in rural Uganda. It ignored peri-urban and urban areas in Uganda. In addition, the study focused only on MDIs and ignored other financial institutions. Besides, the study was purely quantitative, therefore, further research through interviews may be useful in future. Furthermore, the study was carried out in rural Uganda as a developing economy. Thus, future research using the same variables in other developing economies may be useful.

Managers of financial institutions and policy makers should know that market functions of financial intermediaries in developing economies are promoted by institutional framework of regulative, normative and procedural and declarative cognition that lowers transaction cost and promotes information sharing. Therefore, more efforts should be directed towards strengthening the existing institutional framework of regulative, normative and cognition to promote financial intermediation by financial institutions such as MDIs.

This paper is the first to test the relationship between institutional framework and their effects on financial intermediation by MDIs in developing economies. The results revealed existence of two new factor structures of procedural and declarative cognition in explaining financial intermediation by MDIs in developing economies like Uganda. This is sparse in financial intermediation literature and theory.

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between regulation of non‐bank financial institutions and their risk‐taking behaviours in Ghana.

The analysis is performed using data derived from the Bank of Ghana Database during a five‐year period, 2006‐2010. Correlated Panels Corrected Standard Errors model is used to estimate the regression equation. Capital adequacy requirements and the restrictions on non‐bank financial institutions' (NBFIs') ability to take deposits are used as proxies for regulatory pressure. The study also used the ratio of risks weighted assets‐to‐total assets, the ratio of non‐performing loans‐to‐net loans and the Z‐scores of NBFIs as measures of risk.

The results of the study show a negative relationship between minimum capital adequacy requirement and the risks weighted assets of NBFIs. This indicates that, asking NBFIs to keep higher minimum capital adequacy ratio results in reducing their risk‐taking. The results also indicate a positive relationship between regulatory pressure and risk weighted assets of NBFIs. The paper however found a negative relationship between restrictions on deposits and the risk of insolvency. The findings suggest that, non‐deposit‐taking NBFIs have higher risk weighted assets and are more prone to the risk of insolvency than deposit‐taking NBFIs.

The value of this study is in respect of its contribution to the extant literature on financial regulation and risk‐taking of NBFIs.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors that influence financial institutions’ lending to the agricultural sector in Kenya.

The paper employs a panel data of 15 licensed financial institutions (commercial banks and deposit-taking microfinance institutions) from 2011 to 2016. The random effects and ordinary least squares panel corrected standard errors estimation techniques are employed to estimate the effect of liquidity, size, equity, lending rate (LR), type of financial institution and non-performing loans on agri-lending.

The results indicate that only 3.9 per cent of loan portfolio of the sampled financial institutions were advanced to the agricultural sector over the study period. From the panel regression analysis, the paper finds agricultural credit risk to reduce lending to the agricultural sector while size, LR and type of financial institution were observed to significantly increase agricultural lending. Compared to 2011, agri-lending was also observed to have declined between 2012 and 2015.

The findings highlight important indicators for enhancing lending to the agricultural sector in Kenya and other emerging economies.

As far as the authors are concerned, this presents the first empirical evidence on the determinants of agri-lending by financial institutions in Kenya.

This paper aims to examine how central Banks (in the narrow purview of Bank of Uganda) exercise their supervisory mandate to foster an efficient sound business environment for banks to operate efficiently. The authors were motivated to write on the subject of bank supervision because of the closure of Crane Bank and putting it under administration in 2016. The closure of this bank generated a lot of controversies on both sides of the political divide and in the press. Initially, the popular view was that Crane bank was poorly supervised, and as a result, it was exploited by insiders to commit money laundering, fraud, insider dealing, just to mention but a few. This put Bank of Uganda (the Central Bank) in a negative spotlight for failure to provide the required oversight of this bank. In Uganda, the supervision of banks and other financial institutions is the responsibility of Bank of Uganda.

The authors adopted a qualitative research approach using secondary data sources, including books, journal papers and websites, and evaluating primary legislation but also empirical evidence both in Uganda and other jurisdictions. The secondary data was evaluated to draw comparative analyses of causes of banks failures in countries both in Africa, Europe, USA and others jurisdictions across the globe.

It would be onerous to charge central banks with the responsibility of preventing bank failures, even though they would are required to institute measures to prevent banks from collapsing and its ripple effects on the economy. Effective banking supervision is a core factor for the success of every bank, but it cannot single-handedly prevent a bank from collapsing. A well-supervised bank can also fail not necessarily because of inherent weaknesses within its banking supervision, but it could fail because of extraneous factors beyond the control of individual banks. For example, Lehman Brothers Ltd (a highly leveraged of broker dealers) collapsed due to factors beyond its control, the Northern Rock and Royal Bank of Scotland in the UK were nationalised by the British Government.

The limitation of the paper was that data on central banks and failed banks both in Uganda and other jurisdictions (the scope of the paper) was overwhelming, and it was daunting to sift through and analyse it in depth.

Banks play a fundamental role in the social-economic development of countries, and how they are regulated is significantly important for the stability of economies. They provide loans, guarantees and other financial products to businesses, and they are engines for economic growth and development.

Banks affect, people, societies, businesses, markets and governments. Therefore, this paper has wider implications for the foregoing constituencies.

The originality of the paper is that this paper is unique, draws experiences across jurisdictions and evaluates in the narrow purview of banking regulation in Uganda.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the empirical relationship between microsavings and the financial performance of microfinance institutions (MFIs) in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).

The approach in this paper is decidedly empirical, and employs data obtained from Microfinance Information eXchange (MIX). The data set consists of 350 microfinance MFIs domiciled in 36 Sub-Saharan African countries for the period covering 1998–2012.

The panel estimation results consistently show that there exists a negative and statistically significant relationship between microsavings and the financial performance of MFIs in SSA. This is perhaps surprising, albeit rational considering the exceedingly elevated operating expenses that ascend from mobilizing and managing microsavings, ceteris paribus, that could erode firm profitability. The paper draws policy implications from these important findings.

Even though generalized method of moment estimation technique was employed and robustness checks, the issue of endogeneity cannot be eliminated entirely.

Microfinance industry is one of the fastest growing segments of the financial sector in SSA. The industry is increasingly becoming the core of financial inclusion in the region where two-thirds of the adult population lack access to formal financial services. Therefore, gaining an in-depth understanding of the role microsavings play in the financial performance of MFIs can contribute to the growth of the industry.

This study is timely considering the significant growth in the number of microsavings – there are currently twice as many microsavings accounts in SSA as there are microcredits. More importantly, based on 400 MFIs, that reported data to MIX in 2016, the total microsavings stood at about US$11bn against an aggregate loan portfolio of about US$10.5bn. The remarkable growth of microsavings in SSA, from less than US$100m in 2000 to US$11bn in 2016, is the main motivation of undertaking this study.

The purpose of this paper is to test for the predictive power of each of the dimensions of social network in explaining financial inclusion of the poor in rural Uganda.

The study employed a cross-sectional research design and data were collected from a total of 400 poor households located in Northern, Eastern, Central and Western Uganda. The authors adopted ordinary least square hierarchical regression analysis to test for the predictive power of each of the dimensions of social network in explaining financial inclusion of the poor in rural Uganda. The effects were determined by calculating the significant change in coefficient of determination (R²) between the dimensions of social network in explaining financial inclusion. In addition, analysis of variance was also used to test for variation in perceptions of the poor about being financially included.

The findings revealed that the dimensions of ties and interaction significantly explain financial inclusion of the poor in rural Uganda. Contrary to previous studies, the results indicated that interdependence as a dimension of social network is not a significant predictor of financial inclusion of the poor in rural Uganda. Combined together, the dimensions of social network explains about 16.6 percent of the variation in financial inclusion of the poor in rural Uganda.

The study was purely cross-sectional, thus, ignoring longitudinal survey design, which could have investigated certain characteristics of the variable over time. Additionally, although a total sample amounting to 400 poor households was used in the study, the results cannot be generalized since other equally marginalized groups such as the disabled persons, refugees, and immigrants were not included in this study. Furthermore, the study used only the questionnaire to elicit responses from the respondents. The use of interview was ignored during data collection.

Policy makers, managers of financial institutions, and financial inclusion advocates should consider social network dimensions of ties and interaction as conduits for information flow and sharing among the poor including the women and youth about scarce financial resources like loans. Advocacy towards creation of societal network that brings the poor together in strong and weak ties is very important in scaling up access to and use of scarce financial services for improving economic and social well-being.

Contrary to previous studies, this particular study test the predictive power of each of the dimensions of social network in explaining financial inclusion of the poor in rural Uganda. Thus, it methodologically isolates the individual contribution of each of the dimensions of social network in explaining financial inclusion of the poor. The authors found that only ties and interaction are significant predictors of financial inclusion of the poor in rural Uganda. Therefore, the findings suggest that not all dimensions of social network are significant predictors of financial inclusion as opposed to previous empirical findings.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the interaction between multinational enterprises (MNEs) and public governance institutions in regions of limited statehood by focusing on three areas of inquiry: first, the impact of MNEs in these environments; second, the mechanisms and levels through which MNEs engage with external governance processes; and finally, the strategic motivation for the mode and level of engagement.

The authors follow an applied qualitative research approach, drawing on the principles of case study design, through interviews with executives that were involved in setting up four MNEs in Afghanistan.

The results reveal a relationship between the depth of country embeddedness and the level of engagement of MNEs with public institutions and this is related to issues around risk mitigation and time horizons. Deeper embeddedness in the local markets brings greater exposure to risk leading to more and wider engagement in governance processes and cross-sector partnerships in order to influence these concerns.

The research contributes to institutional theory and demonstrates the interplay between organizations and the institutional surroundings. MNEs in Afghanistan are deeply affected by institutional weakness which contribute toward greater uncertainty and impact their behavior, but MNEs also have a direct bearing on institutions.

In fragile and conflict-affected states, MNEs can contribute toward peace and institution building and reinforce cycles of positive development, or they can further pathological behavior and contribute to conflict.

MNEs are increasingly going to be expected to step into the gaps associated with institutional voids and this will require a different approach to doing business and their choice of approach will have a direct bearing on social outcomes in host countries.

The authors reveal two models of MNE engagement in these areas of limited statehood, namely an embedded vs autonomous model and examine their implications.