Resource Dependence and Financial Development

Abstract

The need to absorb windfalls gains and manage them appropriately has been discussed extensively by academics and policy makers alike. We explore the role of the financial sector in intermediating these windfalls. Controlling for the level of financial development, inflation, GDP growth and country fixed-effects, we find a relative decline in financial sector deposits in countries that experience an unexpected natural resource windfall as measured by shocks to exogenous world prices. Moreover, we find a similar…