This paper has five sections. Section I covers the introduction while Section II presents a brief account of a changing perspective on financial reform as it has evolved since the 1970s both from the point of view of the implementation of financial reform policies and the theoretical developments in academic literature. Section III outlines the main strands of financial reform experiences in a sample of countries – both successful and failed – in so far as they relate to the sequencing of financial reform elements. Section IV focuses on the analytical underpinnings of sequencing of the key elements such as interest rate deregulation phasing out of directed credit introduction of competition and other related issues. The final section contains a summary.