Financial Performance of Foreign Banks in Developing Countries: Evidence from Sub-Saharan African Banking Markets

This paper examines empirically the performance of foreign banks' affiliates in sub-Saharan Africa over a 10-year period using BankScope database and exploit data from a novel bank survey to triangulate information obtained from financial statements. Comparing the performance of the foreign affiliates of global banks from developed countries to that of regional African banks, the author finds that the latter are less profitable (lower return on equity) than the former, and this result is robust across specifications.