Prologue: The management of distressed banks in developing economies: an overview

This chapter explores bank insolvencies and associated laws or policies in a selection of developing economies in Africa. It provides a rigorous scrutiny of the efficacy of asset management companies, bridge banks and securitisation in resolving financially distressed banks in the country often caused by non-performing loans. Nevertheless, the state of banking law in these developing economies, particularly those that relate to their fiscal stability and resolution of insolvency events, is also critical and deserving of tailored consideration for several reasons. The authors now briefly turn attention to the legal nature of banks, and how this nature impacts upon current and proposed treatment of bank-stakeholder interests in developing economies in an insolvency scenario. Indeed, custom-built bank insolvency laws of many countries, some of which are presented in this book, attest to this. They briefly introduce typical bank insolvency procedures or systems that will be amplified in the context of developing economies.