Financial Depth in the WAEMU: Benchmarking Against Frontier SSA Countries

23 Pages Posted: 7 Jul 2013 Last revised: 22 Feb 2017

See all articles by Calixte Ahokpossi

Calixte Ahokpossi

International Monetary Fund (IMF)

Kareem Ismail

International Monetary Fund (IMF)

Sudipto Karmakar

Bank of England

Mesmin Koulet-Vickot

Bank of Central African States

Multiple version iconThere are 2 versions of this paper

Date Written: July 5, 2013

Abstract

Financial depth in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) has been uneven over the last two decades. The WAEMU countries are lagging behind other regions, particularly the High Growth Non-oil Exporters (HGNOEs) group. We use two complementary methodologies to compare the two groups of countries. In a panel of 16 countries over 1997-2009, we find that the financial gap between the two groups of countries can be explained by institutional factors. In a benchmarking exercise comparing the major economy in the WAEMU (Côte d’Ivoire) with the most structurally similar in the control group (Mozambique), we show that Côte d’Ivoire underperformed relative to Mozambique and to its estimated potential. We then identify policy and institutional asymmetries between the two countries that could explain the gap in performance.

Keywords: Financial development, Financial possibility frontier, Benchmarking, WAEMU

JEL Classification: E51, G28

Suggested Citation

Ahokpossi, Calixte and Ismail, Kareem and Karmakar, Sudipto and Koulet-Vickot, Mesmin, Financial Depth in the WAEMU: Benchmarking Against Frontier SSA Countries (July 5, 2013). IMF Working Paper No. 13/161 (2013), Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2290378 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2290378

Calixte Ahokpossi

International Monetary Fund (IMF) ( email )

700 19th Street, N.W.
Washington, DC 20431
United States

Kareem Ismail

International Monetary Fund (IMF) ( email )

700 19th Street N.W.
Washington, DC 20431
United States

Sudipto Karmakar (Contact Author)

Bank of England ( email )

Threadneedle Street
London, EC2R 8AH
United Kingdom

Mesmin Koulet-Vickot

Bank of Central African States ( email )

736 Av. Mgr. VOGT
BP 1917
Yaounde
Cameroon

Do you have a job opening that you would like to promote on SSRN?

Paper statistics

Downloads
39
Abstract Views
577
PlumX Metrics