It is well documented that global banks contribute to international shock transmission via cross-border lending. Yet, global banking has taken another form over the recent decades with the expansion of banks abroad via branches and subsidiaries. This expansion has especially happened from and to developing and emerging economies, as countries have opened up their banking sector to foreign investors (Claessens and van Horen, 2012).

In 2009, G-8 Leaders set a goal of reducing remittance costs to 5 percent within 5 years, roughly a 5 percentage point decrease. Instead, the cost of sending remittances from G-20 countries to "high risk" countries has stayed almost flat, and to "less risky" countries, has decreased slightly more than 1 percentage point.

For over a decade now, Africa has been experiencing a higher growth rate compared to the rest of the world. Many African
countries
are being strengthened by a wave of reforms in all sectors, which favours

Almost 1 billion people live on less than $1.90 per day. Most of them live in Africa, which means that more than 40% of the continent's citizens experience extreme poverty. What is wrongly assumed is that improved financial literacy and education will improve their financial situation. The OECD measures financial literacy along four dimensions: financial control, financial planning, choosing financial products and financial knowledge.