Low-Income Countries' Access to Private Debt Markets

Doug Hostland

No 4829, Policy Research Working Paper Series from The World Bank

Abstract: Private debt flows to developing countries surged to record levels over the period 2003-07. A few low-income countries have gained access to the international bond market but the bulk of the flows have continued to go to just a few large middle-income countries. Most low-income countries still heavily depend on concessional loans and grants from the official sector to meet their financing needs. The paper provides an overview of low-income countries' access to cross-border bank lending and bond issuance in the international market over the past few decades. It highlights some stylized facts that characterize salient features of low-income countries' experience in external borrowing from the private sector and discusses the various factors that influence governments' and corporations' decisions to seek external financing along with creditors' decisions to provide the financing. The paper concludes by assessing the prospects for low-income countries' access to private debt markets over the medium term.

Keywords: accounting; asset class; asymmetric information; availability of credit; average debt; balance of payments; bank lending; bank loan; bank loans; basis points; binding constraint; bond indexes (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F21 F32 F34 G15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 34 pages
Date: 2009-02-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dev
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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