Political Booms, Financial Crises
52 Pages Posted: 17 Sep 2014
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Political Booms, Financial Crises
Political Booms, Financial Crises
Political Booms, Financial Crises
Date Written: August 19, 2014
Abstract
We show that political booms, measured by the rise in governments’ popularity, predict financial crises above and beyond other better-known early warning indicators, such as credit booms. This predictive power, however, only holds in emerging economies. We show that governments in emerging economies are more concerned about their reputation and tend to ride the short-term popularity benefits of weak credit booms rather than implementing politically costly corrective policies that would help prevent potential crises. We provide evidence of the relevance of this reputation mechanism.
Keywords: credit booms, reputation, financial crises, political popularity, emerging markets
JEL Classification: D82, E44, E51, E58, G01, H12, N10, N20
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