The analysis of external economic relations of Russia reveals a paradox: while Europe is the main trade and direct investment partner of Russia, this is far from being the case concerning its currency’s role in Russia's financial activities. The dollar is much preferred by economic agents for...

The volatility of financial markets has been a relevant topic for transition economies, as the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union have seemingly endured high levels of volatility in their financial sectors during the transition process. But what have been the...

The paper investigates the influences of financial development on patterns of industrial specialization across China’s regions. We find that industrial sectors reliant on access to external finance are found to concentrate in regions with developed financial markets. Both foreign direct...

This paper examines the effect of banking on economic growth in modern Russia. To overcome simultaneity and selection, we exploit regional banking variation induced by the creation of “specialized banks” (spetsbanks) in the last years of the Soviet Union (1988-1991). Consistent with the...

This paper examines financial sector characteristics in resource-dependent economies. Using a unique dataset covering 133 countries, we present empirical evidence that the banking sector tends to be smaller in resource-dependent economies, even when controlling for several other factors which...

This paper investigates stock market reaction to debt arrangements in Russia. The analysis of the valuation of debt arrangements by stock markets provides information about the use of debt by Russian companies. We apply the event study methodology to check whether debt announcements lead to...

The aim of this paper is to analyze the effect of corruption in bank lending. Corruption is expected to hamper bank lending, as it is closely related to legal enforcement, which has been shown to promote banks’ willingness to lend. Nevertheless the similarities between the consequences for...

The aim of this study is to investigate the impact of corruption on bank lending in Russia. This issue is of major interest in order to understand the causes of financial underdevelopment and the effects of corruption in Russia. We use regional measures of corruption and bank-level data to...

We focus on the conflict between two central bank objectives – individual bank stability and systemic stability. We study the licensing policy of the Central Bank of Russia (CBR) during 1999-2002. Banks in poorly banked regions, banks that are too big to be disciplined adequately, and banks...

The paper presents a study of Russian banks' interest rates on household deposits during the formation period of the deposit insurance system. It is shown that market discipline weakened after deposit insurance was effectively in place.