Banking Sector Competition and Financial Development in Sub-Saharan Africa

The study sort to establishing a relationship between banking sector competition and financial development in subSaharan n Africa. The study further disaggregated the data used into Francophone and Anglophone countries, and these were examined separated and compared. Using an annual data on banks across 37 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa spanning the period 2001-2016 and employing the Fixed Effects estimation technique, the study revealed that there is a positive and significant relationship between financial development (FDCredit) and competition (CR3) for the full sample and the anglophone samples. The study further revealed that banking sector stability is essential for the financial development of both Anglophone and francophone countries within the sub-region. Macroeconomic variables did not have any impact on financial development generally except in francophone countries where exchange rates were found to have an impact on financial development. Bank-level variables such as ZSCORE, non-performing loans, profitability, liquidity and capitalization, on the hand had little impact in Anglophone countries on financial development compared to francophone countries. The study found that larger banks contribute positively to the development of the financial sector and banks tend to be bigger in Anglophone countries, and their banking sector is also more competitive than the francophone countries for the period used. Less emphasis should be placed on bank-level variables as these do not have significant impacts on the financial sector for Anglophone countries. Francophone countries should, however, control bank-level variables to ensure that they achieve greater financial development. Citation: Ricky-Okine, C. K., Amankwaa, T.and Anane, E.Banking Sector Competition and Financial Development in Sub-Saharan Africa,2020; 5(3): 58-85. Received: July 18, 2020Accepted: September 30, 2020