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Foreign banks can play an important role in facilitating international trade. Most research has focused on the financing role banks can play, but less is known about the information role. This paper estimates a gravity model using sub-regional data from Turkey between 2002 and 2010 to explore whether foreign banks promote trade through the information channel. The presence of a foreign banks from a trade partner promote the exports of the sub-region. In addition, the analysis finds that the footprint of these foreign banks matters more for exports than the presence of these banks and the level of financial development of the sub-region. Banks from countries neighboring trade partners can also decrease exports. When taking into account financial conditions and examining the differential impacts during the recent financial crisis, the analysis finds that the footprint of foreign banks has the largest impact on trade.

Credit Constraints --- Foreign Banks --- Regional Development --- Trade

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This study presents results from a randomized evaluation of two labor market interventions targeted to young women aged 18 to 19 years in three of Nairobi's poorest neighborhoods. One treatment offered participants a bundled intervention designed to simultaneously relieve credit and human capital constraints; a second treatment provided women with an unrestricted cash grant, but no training or other support. Both interventions had economically large and statistically significant impacts on income over the medium term (7 to 10 months after the end of the interventions), but these impacts dissipated in the second year after treatment. The results are consistent with a model in which savings constraints prevent women from smoothing consumption after receiving large transfers-even in the absence of credit constraints, and when participants have no intention of remaining in entrepreneurship. The study also shows that participants hold remarkably accurate beliefs about the impacts of the treatments on occupational choice.

Cash Grants --- Credit Constraints --- Entrepreneurship --- Gender --- Microenterprises --- Training --- Youth Unemployment

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Female entrepreneurship is low in many developing economies partly because of constraints on women's time and mobility, which are often reinforced by social norms. This paper analyzes a marketing experiment designed to encourage women to adopt a new microcredit product. A brochure with the same content but two different covers was randomly distributed among male and female borrowing groups. One cover featured five businesses run by men, while the other showed identical businesses run by women. Men and women responded to psychological cues. Among men who were not business owners, had lower measured ability and whose wives were less educated, the responses to the female brochure were more negative, as did female business owners with low autonomy within the household. Women with relatively high levels of autonomy had a similar negative response to the male brochure, while there was no effect on female business owners with autonomy. Overall, these results suggest that women's response to psychological cues, such as positive role models, may be affected by their level of autonomy at home, and more intensive interventions may be required for more disadvantaged women.

Access to Finance --- Banks & Banking Reform --- Business in Development --- Competitiveness and Competition Policy --- Credit Constraints --- Debt Markets --- Finance and Financial Sector Development --- Information --- Microfinance --- Private Sector Development

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This paper identifies the relative importance of human and physical capital for entrepreneurship. A subset of rural microfinance clients were offered eight full time days of business training and the opportunity to participate in a loan lottery of up to Rs. 100,000 (USD 1,700), about seven times the average loan size. The study finds that business training increased business knowledge, reduced business failure, improved business practices and increased household expenditures by about USD 40 per year. It also improved financial and labor allocation decisions. These effects are concentrated among male clients, however. Women improve business knowledge but show no improvements in other outcomes. A cost-benefit analysis suggests that business training was not cost-effective for the microfinance institution, despite having a positive impact on clients. This may explain why so few microfinance institutions offer training. Access to the larger loan, in contrast, had little effect, indicating that existing loan size limits may already meet the demand for credit for these clients.

Access to Finance --- Business Environment --- Business in Development --- Business Training --- Competitiveness and Competition Policy --- Credit Constraints --- E-Business --- Entrepreneurship --- Finance and Financial Sector Development --- Microfinance --- Private Sector Development

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Female entrepreneurship is low in many developing economies partly because of constraints on women's time and mobility, which are often reinforced by social norms. This paper analyzes a marketing experiment designed to encourage women to adopt a new microcredit product. A brochure with the same content but two different covers was randomly distributed among male and female borrowing groups. One cover featured five businesses run by men, while the other showed identical businesses run by women. Men and women responded to psychological cues. Among men who were not business owners, had lower measured ability and whose wives were less educated, the responses to the female brochure were more negative, as did female business owners with low autonomy within the household. Women with relatively high levels of autonomy had a similar negative response to the male brochure, while there was no effect on female business owners with autonomy. Overall, these results suggest that women's response to psychological cues, such as positive role models, may be affected by their level of autonomy at home, and more intensive interventions may be required for more disadvantaged women.

Access to Finance --- Banks & Banking Reform --- Business in Development --- Competitiveness and Competition Policy --- Credit Constraints --- Debt Markets --- Finance and Financial Sector Development --- Information --- Microfinance --- Private Sector Development