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Nigeria's Vision 2020 has expressed a bold desire for the country to be among the world's top 20 economies by the year 2020. The economy has posted impressive growth figures since 2003, driven by higher oil revenues and a series of home-grown economic reforms. The country is now firmly on the road to middle-income status. But what else do government and the private sector need to do to create the jobs and growth that will underpin the national development strategy? What are the challenges that Nigeria's businesses face today? 'An Assessment of the Investment Climate in Nigeria' provides answers to these questions. Based on a survey of 2,300 companies, it provides evidence-based recommendations designed to support Vision 2020 and the president's seven-point agenda. The authors find that government must move quickly to create jobs and reduce poverty. Key challenges include a desperate shortage of energy and a poor transportation network, as well as low levels of education and continuing unrest in the Niger delta. In addition, Nigeria's workers need to become more productive in order to compete in a globalized economy. As a matter of fact, they are less productive than workers in more dynamic countries, such as Brazil, China, and Kenya. Improving productivity will require simultaneous efforts to foster competition, improve specific aspects of the business environment, and facilitate better management and training within individual firms. In addition to the issues of productivity, Nigeria's best firms have not been able to expand their market share. Consequently, policy makers need to address and elimate obstacles to competition, including barriers to entry, convoluted taxation, property registration, and licensing.

This independent evaluation of the Doing Business Indicators assesses the methods and processes used to construct the indicators, their relevance to development outcomes, and their usefulness to policy makers and other stakeholders.

The importance of data assets as intangible corporate assets is being emphasized as more business activities based on digital technology are being carried out. This study proposes the development of a data valuation model that can enable companies to use data assets as collateral for loans in financial transactions. To this end, a model was designed with a focus on the cost approach, which is less likely to involve arbitrariness and error among other valuation model approaches. Furthermore, a model simulation was conducted after securing transaction data of a Korean secondhand marketplace provider. Among the total costs of this marketplace provider, the cost of using data reflecting the ratio of data activities was derived, focusing on financial statements and tangible and intangible assets for the last five years. The data asset acquisition costs were derived, and the data replacement costs were calculated by reflecting the past price and wage growth rates. The results revealed that simulation companies could use a total of KRW 26.8 billion worth of data as collateral for a loan. Accordingly, the data valuation model developed in this study will contribute to reinforcing the value of corporate data assets and proposing a new means of corporate financing.

This paper argues, in contrast to some previous scholarship, that debt bondage was not practiced in Egypt’s Late Period (c. 8th–5th centuries BC). The phenomena of self-sales into slavery and the inclusion of children in lists of security in loan contracts have been offered as evidence of debt bondage in past studies: in the former, arguing that self-sales were a means to satisfy debts; in the latter, that seizure of children into bondage was precipitated by default on a debt. But there is no evidence for these manifestations of debt bondage in practice. In an examination of all relevant self-sales and loan contracts of the period, it can be shown that in no case was a person seized for security or in distraint, and that self-sales did not occur specifically as a result of debtor default. In practice, creditors likely pursued punitive measures such as fine or high interest rather than the potentially expensive and troublesome seizure of debtors. The conditional clauses regarding seizure or distraint reflected in loan documents must thus be regarded as notional rather than actionable, more representative of the social rather than financial capital at stake when one defaulted on a debt. Excluding debt bondage from the Egyptian socio-economic landscape of the period opens the discussion to the implications for social practice, family life, and credit systems.

In this paper, we empirically investigate whether collateral mitigates adverse selection problems in a loan market. Theory predicts a negative relation between the presence of collateral and the interest spread of a loan. However, bankers’view and most empirical evidence contradict this prediction and support the observed-risk hypothesis instead. We provide new evidence from a sample of 4,940 bank loans from 31 countries. We test whether the degree of information asymmetry affects the positive link between collateral and the loan spread and find that a greater degree of information asymmetry reduces this positive relation. This finding provides support for both the adverse selection and observed-risk hypotheses.

We examine the relation between borrowing costs and the presence of loan collateral. We find the presence of collateral increases with default risk, consistent with low quality borrowers reducing their risks and borrowing costs through the use of collateral. By explicitly controlling for the interdependence between the decision to pledge collateral and borrowing costs, we find that secured loans have predicted spreads substantially lower than if they had been made on an unsecured basis. Alternatively, loans made on an unsecured basis have spreads not substantially different from if they had been secured. The evidence suggests that collateral pledging decisions are generally consistent with borrowing cost minimization.

Todd Hill, Pawngo.com CEO, discusses his online pawn business and how the services and clientele differ from conventional pawn shops. He speaks on Bloomberg Television's 'Bloomberg Surveillance.'

Microfinance is not simply banking; it is a development tool. It has been estimated that there are 500 million economically active poor people in the world operating microenterprises and small businesses. Most of them do not have access to adequate financial services. The purpose of this Handbook is to bring together in a single source guiding principles and tools that will promote sustainable microfinance and create viable institutions. The Handbook takes a global perspective, drawing on lessons learned from the experiences of microfinance practitioners, donors, and others throughout the world.This volume covers extensively matters pertaining to the regulatory and policy framework and the essential components of institutional capacity building, such as product design, performance measuring and monitoring, and management of microfinance institutions.The handbook has three parts. 'Issues in Microfinance Provision' - Part I, takes a macroeconomic perspective toward general microfinance issues and is primarily nontechnical. 'Designing and Monitoring Financial Products and Services' - Part II, narrows its focus to the provision of financial intermediation, taking a more technical approach and moving progressively toward more specific (or micro) issues. 'Measuring Performance and Managing Viability' - Part III, is the most technical part of the handbook, focusing primarily on assessing the viability of microfinance institutions.

The definitive history of pawnbroking in the United States from the nation’s founding through the Great Depression, In Hock demonstrates that the pawnshop was essential to the rise of capitalism. The class of working poor created by this economic tide could make ends meet only, Wendy Woloson argues, by regularly pawning household objects to supplement inadequate wages. Nonetheless, businessmen, reformers, and cultural critics claimed that pawnshops promoted vice, and employed anti-Semitic stereotypes to cast their proprietors as greedy and cold-hearted. Using personal correspondence, business records, and other rich archival sources to uncover the truth behind the rhetoric, Woloson brings to life a diverse cast of characters and shows that pawnbrokers were in fact shrewd businessmen, often from humble origins, who possessed sophisticated knowledge of a wide range of goods in various resale markets. A much-needed new look at a misunderstood institution, In Hock is both a first-rate academic study of a largely ignored facet of the capitalist economy and a resonant portrait of the economic struggles of generations of Americans.

Drive through just about any low-income neighborhood and you're sure to see streets lined with pawnshops, check cashers, rent-to-own stores, payday and tax refund lenders, auto title pawns, and buy-here-pay-here used car lots. We're awash in \"alternative financial services\" directed at the poor and those with credit problems. Howard Karger describes this world as an economic Wild West, where just about any financial scheme that's not patently illegal is tolerated.Taking a hard look at this fringe economy, Karger shows that what seem to be small, independent storefront operations are actually part of a fully-formed parallel economy dominated by a handful of well-financed corporations, subject to little or no oversight, with increasingly strong ties to mainstream financial institutions. \"It is a hidden world,\" Karger writes, \"where a customer's economic fate is sealed with a handshake, a smile, and a stack of fine print documents that would befuddle many attorneys.\"Filled with heartbreaking stories of real people trapped in perpetual debt, Shortchanged exposes the deceptive practices that allow these businesses to prey on people when they are most vulnerable. Karger reveals the many ways this industry has run amok, ruining countless people's lives, and shows that it's not just the poor but, more and more, maxed-out middle class consumers who fall prey to these devious schemes.Balancing compassion with a realistic awareness of the risks any business faces in working with an economically distressed clientele, Karger details hard headed, practical recommendations for reforming this predatory industry.