Leveraging local knowledge or global advantage: Cross border bank mergers and acquisitions in Africa

This paper examines global financial markets perception of value creation for banks from across the world initiating or expanding their operations on the African continent through mergers and acquisitions (M&As) over the period 2000–2018. Especially before and during the financial crisis, we document a strong advantage of Pan-African Banks (PABs) over domestic and emerging market banks and a slight advantage over advanced market banks. These results are in line with the hypothesis that PABs benefitted from both a global expertise and local knowledge advantage in the market for corporate control. We also document how retrenchment of global banks during and in the aftermath of the global financial crisis have created opportunities for PABs.