Gender-based entrepreneurial access to bank credit myth or reality

The availability of and access to capital is very important to the growth and sustainability of an economy. Extending credit to women entrepreneurs will help them to start and run their business, thus creating employment and contribute to increasing the wealth of a nation. The objective of the study is to get the views of Credit/Marketing officers of deposit banks on the issue of access to credit by male and female entrepreneurs in order to either affirm or debunk the myth that men have better access to loans than women. Data was gathered from the primary source through a structured questionnaire. Gender diversity is becoming an issue for boards of companies, regulators, and investors worldwide. Nigeria is not an exception. It is assumed that board gender diversity significantly improves corporate governance and financial performance. This study's main objective is to examine the relationship between gender diversity and quoted deposit money banks' performance in Nigeria. Data was collected through the websites of 13 publicly quoted banks on the Nigerian stock exchange. Trend analysis of each bank's percentage of female board members between 2015 and 2019 shows an unstable trend.