Banks´contribution to economic growth : Evidence from European countries

Abstract: A major objective of policy makers is to achive targeted economic growth. Given the role of financial institutions and banks in today´s economy several researchers studied the relationship between economic growth and profitability of banks. This tackles an important policy question, in order to understand the financial markets to prevent a crisis it is relevant for policy makers to understand the contribution of banks´profits in the economic growth. Can proftibale banks contribute to higher economic growth? This thesis aims to test the relationship between the profitability of banks and economic growth for countries within the European Union. To test this relationship this study uses panel data over 25 countries in the EU during the time interval 2010-2020. The used method is an econometric analysis where two regressions will be executed, an Ordinary Least Square regression and a regression that applies the use of a Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) estimator. The results that the study demostreates are consistent with earlier literature, it presents evidence of a positive and statistically significant relationship between the profitability of banks (ROA) and economic growth. However, the results shows an uncertainty of the lagged value of the profitability of banks as insignificant results were obtained in both regressions.