Paper Title
The Impact of Internal Fraud on The Growth of Ghanaian Small and Medium Scale Enterprises

Abstract
Small and medium enterprises’ (SME’s) are the engine of growth of most developing countries as they employ a large number of people as opposed to large firms. Consequently, these enterprises should succeed in expanding to become significant employers and producers. However, what seems obvious at least through cursory observation is that the current state of SME’s betrays an economic loss with respect to the benefits that ought to be forthcoming from their potential. This loss can be triggered by a number of factors. The study determines the drivers of internal fraud and their impact on Ghanaian SME’s. We use primary data collected on 250 SME’s collected on all sectors where SME’s operates across Ghana. Using a cross-sectional regression, we identify the key drivers of internal fraud that hamper the growth of Ghanaian SMEs. Our study should be useful to managers of SMEs and the security agencies in other economies in their quest to free the SME’s operating space of fraudsters. Key words and phrases- Internal fraud, fraud triangle, regression, small and medium enterprises’, stratified sampling.