The impact of the banking sector development on the financial performance of the communication sector in sierra leone

2.4 Banking Sector Development in Sierra Leone 
According to the published report by the Central bank of Sierra Leone (Leone, 
2018), it stated that the banking system was healthy and stable as it met it 
capital adequacy ratio and also profitable, even though some banks do face 
challenges in their operations. As at the December 2018, it was recorded that 
all the banks met the minimum statutory paid-up capital of thirty billion leones 
(SLE 30bn) and with about 4% increase on the Capital Adequacy Ratio (CAR) 
from 34.20% in 2017 to 38.44% in 2018 and this is above the minimum 
statutory requirement of 15%. However, though the sector has been gradually 
improving and generally stable yet the bank penetration falls below average 
for low-income nations. Ghana was the only nation that recorded an above 
average ratings among nations within the sub-region that comprises of Sierra 
Leone, Nigeria, Gambia, Ghana and Guinea respectively. 

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The banking sector experienced an increased in deposit over the years coming 
from bank penetration, governments’ payment to contractors and other 
sources from the private sector, and this gave rise to a significant increase on 
gross loans and advances of 18.2% as at 2018 from a 2.1% in the year 2017. 
The nations Credit as a share of GDP was very low and about 5% over the 
years. However, Credit as a share of GDP at regional level was observed that 
Liberia recorded 15.8%, Nigeria recorded 12.75, Ghana 11.1%, Guinea 8% 
and Gambia with 6%. 
The nations commerce and finance sector benefited immensely from the 
banking sector as they accounted for the largest share of loan and advances 
facilities. The table below shows the percentage of loans and advances 
granted by the banking sector to various sectors within the real economy;