Relationship Between Financial and Real Sectors: Implications for Stable Economic Development (Evidence from Thailand)

The real sector of an economy is the key section as activities of this sector persuade economic output and is represented by those economic segments that are essential for the progress of GDP of the economy. The sector generates better outcomes if accompanied with a healthier financial system; thus, advancement of financial sector is a means for the growth of real sector. The study in this paper explores the relationship between financial and real sectors of Thailand with the volatility analysis of GDP caused by development of financial market. The GARCH Model, Johansen-Juselius (1990) co-integration test, vector error correction model (VECM), and Granger causality testing approach was employed on time series data over the first quarter of year 1993 until the second quarter of year 2017. Consistent with past studies, both the elements of capital market (i.e. bonds and stock markets) and the money market (i.e. credit to private sector by banks) bears a positive relationship to the GDP, our results shows that both markets help promoting economic growth. We can infer that differences in financial markets’ composition and institutions do matter, as these three major sections – bond market, stock market, and banks– do not simultaneously develop and grow, but at a different level of their growth they complement each other. Our findings suggest that there exists inter dependency between real and financial sector’s technologies which in turn enlightens the effect of financial market development on the GDP growth.