This thesis argues that the financial sector played a positive, but limited role in British economic growth from 1850 to 1913. It examines empirically the role played by different types of financial institutions: commercial banks, stock markets and merchant banks. To this end, the thesis uses recently developed time series and dynamic panel methods for the econometric analysis, alongside new data on different parts of the financial system. The results suggest that at a national level, the growth of commercial banks had a limited impact on British economic development over the long run, and stock markets had no impact. However, changes in bank lending influenced economic growth to a significant extent in the short term. Growing conservatism in bank lending practices did not significantly increase credit constraints, as had been previously suspected. Findings from new geographically disaggregated data indicate that the spread of bank offices improved the economic performance of English and Welsh counties. Increased concentration of the banking industry did not hinder economic growth, a result that challenges widespread suggestions in the relevant literature. Moreover, the development of provincial stock exchanges – exchanges outside London - did not influence county-level economic growth, contrary to the view that they were important for the expansion of local industry. Finally, this thesis is the first to assess econometrically the role of merchant banks. It demonstrates that their trade financing activities were beneficial not only for the growth of British international trade, but also for that of the domestic economy.

This dissertation examines three distinctive issues that concern the regulators and policy makers in the development of financial markets. It contains three stand-alone research projects within the context of law, finance and economic growth. Chapter 2 examines the dynamic relationship between banks and economic growth from the points of view of market efficiency and asset pricing theory. Publicly traded banks are broadly representative of a country???s banking sector, so that banking industry stock prices will broadly reflect the performance of a country???s banking sector. Because previous research has established that the institutional framework, as well as the aggregate size, of the banking sector can significantly affect economic growth, this chapter investigates whether the stock returns on a country???s banking sector contain information about future economic growth, and whether the specific country and institutional characteristics that affect the functioning of the banking system and market efficiency also influence this relationship. Using the data from 18 developed and 18 emerging markets, the chapter finds a significant and positive relationship between bank excess return and future economic growth in both the time-series and panel analyses. The chapter also finds that this positive relationship is significantly strengthened by the enforcement of insider trading law, by banking crises, by bank disclosure regulations and financial development, but is weakened by government ownership of banks. Chapter 3 investigates the role of bank idiosyncratic volatility in economic growth and systemic banking crises. Using the same dataset from Chapter 2, this chapter finds an ambiguous relationship between bank volatility and economic growth in the time-series studies, which suggests that the effect of bank volatility on economic growth is more country-specific. In the panel analyses, the chapter finds a negative but very weak relationship between bank volatility and future economic growth. This negative relationship is magnified by banking crises and bank disclosure standards, but is alleviated by the government ownership of banks, the enforcement of insider trading law and financial development. The chapter goes further to examine whether bank volatility leads to the occurrence of systemic banking crises, and finds that the marginal effect of bank volatility on the probability of banking crises is very weak for the sample of all markets, and this result is mainly driven by the data from the emerging markets. However, bank volatility is a significant predictor of banking crises even after being controlled for macroeconomic indicators, which implies that market forces are more powerful in promoting the soundness of the banking system in developed markets. We also find that those macroeconomic and banking risk management indicators have different impacts on the probability of banking crises for the emerging and developed markets. Therefore, caution needs to be taken in interpreting the cross-country results of the studies on banking crises. Chapter 4 studies the corporate governance issues in China, a significant developing country that has been neglected by the current law and finance literature. Incorporated with the legal environment and ownership structure of China???s listed companies, the chapter develops a simple game model to study a neglected aspect of current corporate governance literature: the expropriation arising from the mixture of weak investor protection, ownership concentration coexisting with ownership dispersion, and the absence of a controlling shareholder. The last two chapters find that government ownership undermines the positive link between bank excess return and economic growth, but alleviates the negative impact of bank volatility on growth as well. This chapter shows that government ownership is also a two-edged sword in corporate governance in China: it leads to a double-agency problem; however, the strong legal protection of State assets also increases the cost of expropriation. Using the data from 1996 to 2003, the chapter finds the empirical evidence consistent with the model. By analysing the puzzles in China???s stock market, the chapter suggests that improving the legal protection of investors is the key issue in the future development of the financial market.

My dissertation consists of empirical and theoretical essays on Microeconomic Theory and International Economics. The first chapter discusses the existence and characterization of a model that determines producer's optimal pricing and allocation rule as a preannounced markdown schedule. The mechanism focuses on pricing and operational implications of allotting scarce resources when customers are heterogeneous in their valuations and sensitivities towards availability of product. The proposed mechanism suggests that a carefully designed multistep markdown pricing could achieve optimal revenue when selling a single unit. However, to sell multiple units, monopolist should modify the implementation of markdown pricing by either hiding the number of available products or selling them via contingent contracts and upfront payments. In the second essay, we study the heterogeneity of finance and growth nexus across countries. Our paper contributes to the literature by investigating whether this impact differs across regions and types of economy. Using a rich dataset, cross-section and dynamic panel estimation results suggest that the beneficial effect of financial deepening on economic growth in fact displays measurable heterogeneity; it is generally smaller in oil exporting countries; in certain regions, such as the Middle East and North Africa (MENA); and in lower-income countries. Further analysis suggests that these differences might be driven by regulatory/supervisory characteristics and related to differing performance on financial access for a given level of depth. The third chapter analyzes contraction of exports in the aftermath of severe financial crises and tests for its heterogeneity across different industries and based on their credit conditions. It provides a theoretical framework to provide insight on why sectors are hit disproportionately during and in the aftermath of severe financial distresses, and confirms most of them with empirical estimations. The findings suggest that industries with greater reliance on outside financing and fewer shares of tangible assets experience greater contractions in export volumes in the years following a severe financial crisis. / text

Financial sector development can reduce poverty and promote economic growth by extending access to financial services in developing countries. Traditionally, banking in Sub-Saharan Africa has been conducted by state-owned banks. Although, evidence has shown that severe government involvement in the banking sector has proved to cause low profitability and inefficiency. During 2001, Uganda Commercial Bank, the dominant provider of banking experienced financial problems; as a result, the government had to privatize the bank. The aim of this thesis is therefore to investigate if the privatization prevented the banking sector from collapse and if it made the sector more competitive and outreaching. The main conclusion is that the privatization strongly prevented the banking sector from collapse. Since privatization, competition has increased sufficiently in urban areas of Uganda while rural areas have not experienced any significant increase in competition. Finally, we conclude that the outreach of banking has increased somewhat since the privatization, but it is still relatively poor.

This paper examines the correlation between credit intermediated by financial systems and economic growth in developing countries. More specifically we have studied whether well-functioning financial markets result in economic growth. We base our study on data from 53 low- and lower-middle income countries in the period 2004-2011. By comparing the two different economic theories, Schumpeter’s growth theory and Austrian business cycle theory, we have analysed our results from two different perspectives. The results from this study show an insignificant relationship between financial systems and economic growth, contradicting much of the theory and results from previous studies that have been reviewed. Other variables outside of the financial system in this study, such as economic freedom and corruption, could be a reason for the non-existent correlation between financial development and economic growth in this study.

This thesis examines the impacts of financial development on economic activities in Vietnam at both the macro and the micro level in three core chapters. The first core chapter examines the role of financial development in growth and sources of growth in Vietnam by using the provincial panel data. It shows that financial development has a positive influence on the efficiency of using savings, on the quantity and quality of investment, on productivity, and hence growth. It also finds that there is an indirect impact of financial development on growth mainly through increasing the quality of foreign direct investment rather than the quantity. The following chapter analyses the determinants of household financial development and its role in economic activities of Vietnamese households by using the Household Data Survey. It suggests that the social relationship, location, fixed assets, household size, education, age and Kinh group are the key determinants of household financial development. Moreover, financial development contributes to household income through improving the level of savings and investment, labour productivity and reducing the problem of asymmetric information. Financial development is positively related to household welfare. The final core chapter looks at the impacts of financial development on firm performance in Vietnam by using the Firm Data Survey. It suggests that around 80.7% of Vietnamese firms lie between 0% and 20% in the efficiency scores derived from the DEA technique for 1,886 firms. Financial development plays a key role in firm performance. Smaller firms benefit more from the higher level of financial development. / http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1349510 / Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, School of Economics, 2008

This dissertation examines three distinctive issues that concern the regulators and policy makers in the development of financial markets. It contains three stand-alone research projects within the context of law, finance and economic growth. Chapter 2 examines the dynamic relationship between banks and economic growth from the points of view of market efficiency and asset pricing theory. Publicly traded banks are broadly representative of a country???s banking sector, so that banking industry stock prices will broadly reflect the performance of a country???s banking sector. Because previous research has established that the institutional framework, as well as the aggregate size, of the banking sector can significantly affect economic growth, this chapter investigates whether the stock returns on a country???s banking sector contain information about future economic growth, and whether the specific country and institutional characteristics that affect the functioning of the banking system and market efficiency also influence this relationship. Using the data from 18 developed and 18 emerging markets, the chapter finds a significant and positive relationship between bank excess return and future economic growth in both the time-series and panel analyses. The chapter also finds that this positive relationship is significantly strengthened by the enforcement of insider trading law, by banking crises, by bank disclosure regulations and financial development, but is weakened by government ownership of banks. Chapter 3 investigates the role of bank idiosyncratic volatility in economic growth and systemic banking crises. Using the same dataset from Chapter 2, this chapter finds an ambiguous relationship between bank volatility and economic growth in the time-series studies, which suggests that the effect of bank volatility on economic growth is more country-specific. In the panel analyses, the chapter finds a negative but very weak relationship between bank volatility and future economic growth. This negative relationship is magnified by banking crises and bank disclosure standards, but is alleviated by the government ownership of banks, the enforcement of insider trading law and financial development. The chapter goes further to examine whether bank volatility leads to the occurrence of systemic banking crises, and finds that the marginal effect of bank volatility on the probability of banking crises is very weak for the sample of all markets, and this result is mainly driven by the data from the emerging markets. However, bank volatility is a significant predictor of banking crises even after being controlled for macroeconomic indicators, which implies that market forces are more powerful in promoting the soundness of the banking system in developed markets. We also find that those macroeconomic and banking risk management indicators have different impacts on the probability of banking crises for the emerging and developed markets. Therefore, caution needs to be taken in interpreting the cross-country results of the studies on banking crises. Chapter 4 studies the corporate governance issues in China, a significant developing country that has been neglected by the current law and finance literature. Incorporated with the legal environment and ownership structure of China???s listed companies, the chapter develops a simple game model to study a neglected aspect of current corporate governance literature: the expropriation arising from the mixture of weak investor protection, ownership concentration coexisting with ownership dispersion, and the absence of a controlling shareholder. The last two chapters find that government ownership undermines the positive link between bank excess return and economic growth, but alleviates the negative impact of bank volatility on growth as well. This chapter shows that government ownership is also a two-edged sword in corporate governance in China: it leads to a double-agency problem; however, the strong legal protection of State assets also increases the cost of expropriation. Using the data from 1996 to 2003, the chapter finds the empirical evidence consistent with the model. By analysing the puzzles in China???s stock market, the chapter suggests that improving the legal protection of investors is the key issue in the future development of the financial market.

This thesis examines the impacts of financial development on economic activities in Vietnam at both the macro and the micro level in three core chapters. The first core chapter examines the role of financial development in growth and sources of growth in Vietnam by using the provincial panel data. It shows that financial development has a positive influence on the efficiency of using savings, on the quantity and quality of investment, on productivity, and hence growth. It also finds that there is an indirect impact of financial development on growth mainly through increasing the quality of foreign direct investment rather than the quantity. The following chapter analyses the determinants of household financial development and its role in economic activities of Vietnamese households by using the Household Data Survey. It suggests that the social relationship, location, fixed assets, household size, education, age and Kinh group are the key determinants of household financial development. Moreover, financial development contributes to household income through improving the level of savings and investment, labour productivity and reducing the problem of asymmetric information. Financial development is positively related to household welfare. The final core chapter looks at the impacts of financial development on firm performance in Vietnam by using the Firm Data Survey. It suggests that around 80.7% of Vietnamese firms lie between 0% and 20% in the efficiency scores derived from the DEA technique for 1,886 firms. Financial development plays a key role in firm performance. Smaller firms benefit more from the higher level of financial development. / http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1349510 / Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, School of Economics, 2008

The aim of this work is to examine the impact of financial development, financial constraints and capital control on stocks market returns. The research looks into stock returns of emerging and developed economies over the period of 2004-2016 by using data, both by firm-level and country level, from 88 developed and emerging countries. Furthermore, the KZ, WW and SA indexes were used to classified as being financially constrained and financially unconstrained and the level of capital control of each group of countries is interacted with financial constraints. We aim to determine the relationship between the variables used as the measurement (depth, access, efficiency and stability) of financial development of a country, the financial constraint and capital control and their relationship to the stock market returns. Previous research focusing on stock market returns have dealt with different influences affecting the stock returns; however, the literature examining the influence of capital control on stock return is scarce. Our results suggest that the extended Fama and French three-factor model including macroeconomic and financial development variables and considering the presence of financial constraints help in the understanding in their impact on asset pricing for emerging and developed countries alike. / Este trabalho tem por objetivo examinar o impacto do desenvolvimento financeiro, das restrições financeiras e do controle de capital no retorno das ações. A pesquisa analisa o retorno das ações dos países emergentes e desenvolvidos durante o período de 2004-2016 através de uma base de dados de 88 países, emergentes e desenvolvidos, com dados tanto ao nível da firma como ao nível do país. Além disso, os índices KZ, WW e SA são usados para classificar as empresas como restritas e não restritas financeiramente, e utiliza-se também as interações do nível de controle de capital com as restrições financeiras. O objetivo é determinar a relação entre as variáveis de desenvolvimento financeiro do país (profundidade, acesso, eficiência e estabilidade), as restrições financeiras e o controle de capital com o retorno de mercado das ações. As pesquisas anteriores acerca do tema retorno lidaram com diferentes fatores que afetam o retorno de ações; entretanto, estudos envolvendo a influência do controle de capital no retorno de ações ainda são escassos Nossos resultados sugerem que um modelo composto coletivamente pelo modelo de três fatores de Fama e French e variáveis macroeconômicas e de desenvolvimento financeiro, considerando ao mesmo tempo restrições financeiras, ajuda na melhor compreensão do impacto de ditas variáveis no preço de ativos em países emergentes e desenvolvidos.

O processo de modernização dos mercados financeiros e de capitais no período compreendido entre 1964 e 2004 é analisado em detalhes, bem como sua correlação com o crescimento econômico brasileiro. São apresentadas, de forma cronológica, as ações desencadeadas durante o período de quarenta anos, pelas autoridades econômicas e pelo Congresso Nacional, para a regulamentação e normatização dos mercados financeiros e de capitais. Na seqüência se analisa de modo detalhado o comportamento da economia brasileira durante todo o período, por meio de um conjunto de estatísticas que mostram os diferentes aspectos macroeconômicos. Esta análise é complementada pelo estudo do comportamento das principais variáveis do mercado financeiro e do mercado de capitais. Discute-se, por fim, a questão teórica das relações entre o desenvolvimento financeiro e o crescimento econômico, mostrando que existe uma relação direta entre o primeiro e o segundo, na medida em que o desenvolvimento financeiro gera crescimento econômico / This dissertation analyses the process of modernization of the Brazilian financial and capital markets and its correlation to the growth and development of the Brazilian economy during the period 1964 to 2004. This dissertation also describes in a chronological fashion, for the past four decades, the policies implemented by the Brazilian economic authorities as well as the ones approved by the Brazilian Congress aimed at establishing the rules and regulations for the Brazilian financial and capital markets. Moreover, the evolution of the Brazilian economy for this period is discussed. A substantial amount of economic data is used to study the different macroeconomic changes that took place during the period under study. Finally, this dissertation elaborates and adds to the theoretical discussion: as to whether or not there is a relationship between economic growth and financial development. This dissertation shows that there is direct relationship between the two, since financial development generates economic growth