Benchmarking Banking Sector Efficiency Across Regional Blocks in Sub-Saharan Africa: What Room for Policy?

This paper examines the determinants of net interest margins in four regional blocks in Sub-Saharan Africa and one comparator block in the Eastern Caribbean. Using bank-level data, the authors find that countries with a high level of operating costs, a high ratio of equity to total assets and high treasury bill interest rates have higher net interest margins.