This paper assesses whether and how financial development triggers the occurrence of banking crises. It builds on a database that includes financial development as well as financial access, depth and efficiency for almost 100 countries. Through estimation of a dynamic logit panel model, it...

For all the ink that has been spilled on the topic of financial regulation since the financial crisis of 2007-2008, there has been little examination of the competing normative goals of financial regulation. Should the financial system be treated as an end in itself, such that the efficiency of...

Developing Asia's financial depth as a whole compares favorably with other parts of the developing world, but there are wide variations across subregions and economies. This paper examines the key features and reform priorities of the financial systems in Bangladesh, Cambodia, Georgia, Mongolia,...

This paper argues that creditors reflect the financial-safety-net aspect of bank lobbying, plausibly considering the connection between bank lobbying and government bailouts. Using a structural approach, I show that bank lobbying is negatively associated with the occurrence of a run-like...

It has been said that the intellectual origins of the global financial crisis (GFC) can be traced back to “blind spots” in traditional financial theory, which obscured complexity and financial innovation in contemporary markets. There has been growing recognition that changes to the modern...

The banking system of the People's Republic of China (PRC) is now the largest in the world, and its capital markets are rapidly approaching the size of those in the advanced economies. This paper traces the evolution of the PRC's financial system away from a traditional bank-dominated and...

The growing complexity of the financial sector and the extreme difficulty to cope with it has been of one the main insights gained from the recent financial crisis. We purport, albeit briefly, to assess some of the consequences of such complexity through the lens of the interplay between the...

We develop a theory of financial stability based on insights from the literature on polycentric governance and institutional resilience. We contend that top-down regulatory approaches to achieving financial stability will prove ineffective, due to various knowledge and incentive problems. In...