Inflation Targeting, Economic Growth and Financial Stability: Evidence from Emerging Countries

Our aim of this paper is to determine whether inflation targeting could improve economic growth and financial stability in 35 emerging economies of which 19 inflation-targeting and 16 non-inflation-targeting countries over the 1995-2017 period. To this end, we first determine the preconditions needed to adopt the inflation targeting regime using the Qualitative Comparative Analysis method (QCA). We then construct a Financial Stability Index (FSI) for emerging markets using a Principal Components Analysis (PCA). Finally, we determine the impact of shocks on economic growth and financial stability in inflation-targeting and non-inflation-targeting countries through a Panel VAR model estimated using the GMM method. The results show that some structural and institutional preconditions, should be set up during the pre-adoption period. In addition, the results indicate that the inflation-targeting regime allows emerging countries to control their economic growth and financial stability in the event of shocks to a greater extent than non-targeting countries, although the magnitude of the shock persists only in the short run, given that economic and financial conditions return to their normal state in the long run.