The Role of Savings Banks in Providing Accessible Finance
Consultants
Start Date:
January 2005
End Date:
September 2005
Country:
International
Client:
World Savings Institute
Project Information
This work analyses and documents the role of savings banks in providing a variety of financial services to poorer households, utilizing data on the member banks of the World Savings Banks Institute (WSBI). The study was ground-breaking in that it estimated the total number of accessible accounts world-wide to be around 1.4 billion (previous estimates were much lower than this) and that no less than 1.1 billion of these accounts involve savings bank and postal savings accounts. In addition the study found that it is misleading to think of savings banks as purely savings-based institutions: at the global aggregate level, savings banks recycle half their deposits into credit. Furthermore, it was also found that savings banks generally have much higher productivity levels than a typical micro finance institution. This forms part of OPM’s continuing work aimed at deepening the statistical and analytical understanding of the "Access" issue.