This paper looks at the experience of South Africa in the development of its local‐currency, so‐called domestic, bond market. Whilst South Africa had the deepest financial market in Sub‐Saharan Africa it also had one of the shallowest domestic bond markets, until 2009. This changed with the rapid bond issuances by the national government as a means to fund its expanding government expenditure. The paper finds that the government issuances served to deepen the market for rand‐based bonds and lengthen the maturities of bonds, for the benefit of itself, state‐owned enterprises, and the private sector, particularly the banks. At the same time, it has heightened the risk of negatively impacting economic development. The World Bank and other multilaterals advocate the development of the domestic bond market as a financial cushion against financial stress and as a way to better channel domestic savings towards domestic investment. There is argument that South Africa's domestic bond market acts as a substitute and competition for the dominant bank market. At the same time, given the market infrastructure and regulation, there is also high risk that the bond market could act as a co‐contagion in the event of a bank crisis. There is no evidence that total savings improved as a result of the bond market, however the provision of a long‐term instrument more theoretically suitable to South Africa's specialist pension and insurance funds suggest that the market provides beneficial intermediation. The recommendations focus on mitigating the negative biases of market infrastructure supports and the pension fund regulation.

Africa has begun to show tremendous socio-economic development and gradually improving market conditions. As a result, Africa's perceived attractiveness has improved as new investment frontiers are sought. It has become crucial that current and future economic and market growth needs can be met by infrastructure and real estate development. In order for the various real estate markets to develop further, they would need to attract a significant amount of capital expenditure, of which a portion may come from institutional investors. In order to achieve this, Africa needs to ensure that the desired investment environment is stimulated in the real estate market so as to redirect some of the capital flows into improving and increasing current and future real estate stock on the continent. This dissertation focuses on real estate in Africa by assessing the nature of the relationship between the maturity of real estate markets and foreign direct investments. It does so by assessing the investment decisions of South African real estate investors with exposure in the rest of the continent. The research findings seek to provide insight into the nature of the relationship and further assess its level of importance for South African real estate investors. Key findings were that maturity of real estate markets correlated poorly with investment activities and investors priorities when making investment decisions. However, maturity is a factor in real estate investment decisions. The aim was to assess the minimum level of maturity that was required for South African investors before entering a market; however, it became clear that mature markets or very immature markets are not necessarily what investors seek. An element of the risk/return profile is influenced by the maturity of markets: the less mature markets have the greater level of risk and the more mature markets have very little risk in comparison.

The aim of this paper is to examine the price effect exerted by derivative warrants on their underlying shares around the introduction and expiration days of the warrants. The study is based on the JSE for the period 2008-2012 and employs the event study methodology. The study assesses the effects generally and for puts and calls separately. Overall, it is found that the price effect depends on the type of warrant as well as the warrant's "moneyness". The in the money sample of puts and calls show significant price effects around the listing and expiration days respectively. The out the money sample of puts and calls indicate no price effect. Each of the samples is subjected to further volume analysis in order to assert if the price effects are linked to any changes in trading volume. This paper has implications for the regulation community and warrant investors on the JSE.

With the ever expanding role of social enterprises globally, this research aims to build awareness of the role that social enterprises play in the Kenyan agricultural sector and investigate the factors that influence the development of agricultural social enterprises in Kenya. The data analysed for this study was collected via semi-structured interviews as part of a wider study, 'A case study of health and agriculture social enterprises in Kenya', commissioned by the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) and implemented by the Bertha Centre for Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business. The writer of this study was part of the team that collected and published the preceding ODI report from the data set now utilised in this study.

Financing instruments are the means by which development finance institutions carry out their mandate of addressing the socio-economic needs of the country, group of countries or a region. It is of great importance that the development and application of financing instruments should be in line with the objectives for which the development finance institutions were established. The literature reviewed was intended to establish the reasons for the existence of development finance institutions and their role in private sector development. Furthermore, literature was reviewed to establish various financing instruments developed and applied by development finance institutions. The study is premised on the fact that new DFIs can be complementary thus an assessment of DFIs will provide instrument and sectoral gaps which the BRCIS Bank can take advantage of. As such, the study was to examine the financing instruments that development finance institutions (DFIs) use to address their economic objectives and identify lessons for the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) Development Bank. The study employed the qualitative exploratory research strategy. Documents and in-depth interviews were used as data. The sample included major multilateral, regional and bilateral development finance institutions operating in developing economies, including BRICS countries. The author established that there are varied founding objectives of development finance institutions and that there is wide use of traditional financing instruments of debt and equity. However, there is limited use of innovative financing instruments such as project finance and those applied in Public Private Partnerships (PPPs). The main recommendation made is that BRICS Bank should take advantage of the existing instrument and sectoral gaps if it is going to survive not only as a competitor but a complementary DFI. In addition it should consider the introduction of innovative instruments that take into account developing and emerging economies realities. In light of mission drift and agency issues the BRICS Bank should have robust governance and monitoring and evaluation frameworks that will ensure that its founding objectives are pursued.

This paper seeks to orientate research on the issues and impacts of pursuing a social innovation approach to development finance and the extent to which it impacts the development of economic, personal and social capital in developing countries. It draws on conceptual ideas around the evolution of development finance from a pure aid perspective to more innovative approaches that seek to increase uptake of development funds where they are needed most (at the base of the pyramid) and reduce fungibility. The paper provides an exploratory case study analysis of attempts by Zoona, a socially innovative private organization in Zambia that is leveraging mobile technology to increase access to finance and financial services to small and micro businesses and the unbanked in Zambia using an agent network. The research was qualitative study and gathered insights from 11 agents and 8 employees through 19 personal interviews. A hybrid approach to thematic analysis was employed in the research and results revealed that whilst Zoona's work was enabling economic and personal growth for the agents it was not necessarily building social capital within communities. The paper concludes with some recommendations on how the concept of socially innovative approaches to development finance, as supplementary forms of distributing development funds to traditional forms, can be improved on when applied by private organizations and local networks to enable the development of economic, personal and social capital and develop the capacity of communities.

The lack of access to finance is cited as one of the major barriers preventing developing countries from attaining economic development. While traditional sources of financing such as Official Development Assistance (ODA), Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and Remittances have done much to alleviate the problem, they have left what is termed the missing middle; a financing gap created by failure to provide financing particularly for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) and for the poor in the subject countries. The major impediments have included lack of collateral, inadequate training and business knowledge and risk aversion on the part of traditional financial institutions such as banks. Further, domestic resource mobilization endeavours have concentrated on tax reforms to improve governments' revenue collection and administration, leaving personal savings aggregation unattended. This financing gap is despite knowledge that MSMEs possess the most potential for employment creation, thus poverty alleviation for the masses. Cooperative Financial Institutions have been in existence for a long time and have the potential to provide innovative solutions in addressing the problem at hand. They have however, received little attention and recognition and the historical association with agriculture and the older generation has limited their outreach and impact. This study is thus intended to explore whether CFIs can bridge the financing gap for MSMEs in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Financial inclusion remains vital for the empowerment of women. Women, particularly in the informal sector, face the challenge of access to formal credit. The aim of the study is to investigate the determinants of access to formal credit by women in the informal sector. A logit regression model is employed as an estimation technique, to empirically test the relationship between individual characteristics and access to formal credit. The study uses data from the 2016 FinScope National Survey to identify which of these determinants affects access to credit in South Africa. The FinScope data consists of a nationally representative sample size of 4992 South African men and women aged 16 years and older. The findings indicate that ‘fear of applying for a loan', ‘loan from moneylenders' as well as ‘loan from family and friends' were variables found to be statistically insignificant determinants of access to credit. In line with expectation, the results indicate that possession of a tertiary education; having undergone vocational training; being older; having access to a communication device; and having a positive attitude towards technology, increase the chances of access to credit. The results also prove the hypotheses that being female; an entrepreneur in the informal sector; possession of a primary education; being based in a rural area; having an irregular source of income; or the use of internal funds are negatively correlated to access to credit. The findings highlight the need to find meaningful solutions to address access to credit for women entrepreneurs in the informal sector in South Africa.

This dissertation examines the impact of commodity price change and exchange rate fluctuations on the capacity of Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries to attain the UN 2030 agenda on sustainable development by using the dynamic panel data of forty-five (45) countries in Sub-Saharan Africa over a twenty-year timeframe (1999–2018). The study used the commodity terms of the trade index to measure commodity price behaviour, the real effective exchange rate index to measure bilateral exchange rate behaviour and lastly, human development index was used as a measure of human development outcomes that are consistent with the 17 SDG targets. The following control variables were included in the model specification: financial development index (a measure of resource allocation efficiency), external financial flow (a measure of foreign exchange flow) and governance indicators (a measure of institutional quality). Furthermore, the Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroskedasticity (GARCH) modeling technique was used in predicting annual volatilities for commodity terms of trade and real effective exchange rate. The generated data was included in the panel data set and the Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) estimation technique was utilised in estimating the regression model. The main findings of this dissertation are that commodity prices, commodity price volatility and the real effective exchange rate all have a positive and significant correlation with sustainable human development, while the real effective exchange rate volatility has a negative and significant correlation with sustainable human development. Financial development was also observed to have a significant and positive effect on sustainable human development, whereas external financial flow and governance quality were found to have an inverse relationship with sustainable human development. However, further analysis of the regression result reveals the presence of ‘resource curse' amongst SSA countries. This can be ascribed to the consistent declining trend in the region's commodity terms of trade and a corresponding decline in the human development index. This situation is simply reminiscent of the need to transform the resource-dependence profile of SSA through the implementation of intuitive policies and strategies that will promote the efficient utilisation of primary commodities to improve the wellbeing of the populace. Hence, focusing on economic diversification, industrialisation of the commodity sector, building quality institutions and better management of the economy should be of greater concern towards the attainment of Sustainable Development Goals rather than depend on foreign aids.

Most underdeveloped countries continue to receive Official Development Aid, and Malawi is not an exception. This research paper examined the effect of Official Development Aid on the Gross Domestic Product and Human Development Index in Malawi, using annual time series data from 1990 to 2018. In addition, the relationship of Gross Domestic Product, Human Development Index and Official Development Aid was analysed using cointegration, correlation and granger causality techniques. The results of cointegration indicated a short term relationship among the variables, hence the Vector Autoregressive (VAR) Model was used together with Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) to study the effect of Official Development Aid to Human Development Index and the effect of Official Development Aid to Gross Domestic Product. In the first VAR Model Equation, Gross Domestic Product was significantly positively influenced by Trade Openness and lagged value of Gross Domestic Product. In the second VAR Model Equation, Official Development Aid and lagged value of Human Development Index were found to positively influence Human Development Index from 1990 to 2018. In addition, Official Development Aid showed significant influence to GDP. In summary, Official Development Aid showed significant positive influence to Human Development Index, while indicating varied results regarding influence to Gross Domestic Product. Findings suggest that policy makers in Malawi should gradually stop relying on donors, explore targeted foreign aid and think of other innovative ways like changing policies on trade openness and human development to boost the country's GDP, among others.