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The role of institutions in both the inflow and the impact of foreign direct investment is of great importance. The quality of institutions in a country can direct investment towards improving growth. This paper analyzes the individual and combined effect of foreign direct investment and institutions on economic growth in Ghana. The paper used the Auto Regressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) technique for secondary data obtained from 1995 to 2019. All data series, except for the quality institution index, were drawn from the World Bank Development Indicators. Institutional Quality Index data was obtained from the Heritage Foundation’s Economic Freedom Index website. The results of the ARDL model indicate that foreign direct investment and a quality institutional index together have a significantly positive effect on a country’s economic growth compared to their individual effects in both the short and long run. The study recommends that government policies should be aimed at attracting foreign direct investment while strengthening institutions and regulations to enhance output growth

The Africa Growth and Opportunity Act was introduced by the United States of America to enable beneficiary countries to boost their export volumes and make way for growth and development. The study aims at estimating the effect of the Act on export from sub-Saharan African countries to the United States of America considering the role of credit. A panel data for 49 countries sourced from IMF DOTS, WDI, and CEPII for the period 1980 to 2020 was employed. Using the GMM, and the differences in differences estimation techniques, the findings showed that the AGOA trade preference has not achieved the purpose for which it was introduced. It is however found that export to the United States can be improved under the trade preference if credit is provided to the private sector. It is therefore recommended that credit accessibility should be made easy to make way for private sector investment in the production process to feed the export sector., Competing Interests: The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (© 2023 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.)

This study examines the effect of mobile money transactions on banking sector performance in Ghana using monthly data for the period 2015-2020. A composite index of banking sector performance was created from three indicators namely; depth, stability and efficiency of the banking sector. Using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) bounds test for cointegration, the Error Correction Model (ECM) and impulse responses analysis, the findings revealed that mobile money transaction has a detrimental effect on banking sector performance. Findings from the disaggregated components indicate that mobile money transactions hurt banking sector efficiency, while its effect on banking sector depth and stability is insignificant in the long run. It is concluded that the implication varies from one indicator to another concerning the direction and magnitude of the influence. The study, therefore, recommends that banks exercise much caution in their decision to consider adopting mobile money-based services when designing their business models., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest., (© 2022 The Author(s).)