Purpose The centrality of agricultural sector to the economy, particularly in developing countries, has drawn the attention of researchers to critically examine different factors determining the performance of the sector. Given that massive investment is required to ensure maximum productivity in the sector, one of the factors identified is the issue of financing. However, financing agricultural sector in a poor institutional environment can be depressing. In the light of this, the purpose of this paper is to examine the nexus between financial development and agricultural performance in Nigeria with a view to investigating the role of institutions. Design/methodology/approach The study employed annual data spanning the period from 1981 to 2016. Three indicators of financial development and five institutional variables were used. Besides, for robust analysis, the study also computed an aggregate measure of financial development and institutions using principal component method. Autoregressive distributed lag method of estimation was used to examine the short-run and long-run effects of financial development on agricultural performance in Nigeria. Findings The findings showed that financial development has a positive impact on agricultural performance in Nigeria. However, this positive impact is being undermined by institutional variables. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the only study that examines the mediating role of institutional factors such as the rule of law, control of corruption, etc., in the financial development–agricultural performance nexus in Nigeria.

Given the effects COVID-19 pandemic on the financial sectors across the world, this study examined the reaction of stock returns of 201 firms listed in the Nigerian Stock Exchange to the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown policy. We deployed both Pooled OLS and Panel VAR as estimation methods. Generally, the results from POLS show the stock market returns of the Nigerian firms reacted negatively more to the global COVID-19 confirmed cases and deaths than the domestic COVID-19 confirmed cases and deaths and lockdown policy. The results of the impulse response functions revealed that the effects of COVID-19 confirmed cases and deaths and lockdown policy shocks on stock returns oscillate between negative and positive before the stock market returns converge to the equilibrium in the long run. The FEVD results showed that growth in the COVID-19 confirmed cases, deaths and lockdown policy shocks explained little variations in stock market returns. Given our finding, we advocate for the relaxation of policy of lockdown and the combine use of monetary and fiscal policies to mitigate the negative effect of COVID-19 pandemic on stock market returns in Nigeria.

The bursting of crude oil prices in the international market since mid-2014 has resulted in dwindling oil revenue, which has led to economic recession in Nigeria. The recession has further exacerbated existing socioeconomic problems bedeviling the country. In the light of this, we examined the effect of government revenues (oil and non-oil revenues) on economic growth, both in the short-run and the long-run using autoregressive distributed lag method. Our findings show that government revenues are indispensable to economic growth in Nigeria. In addition, we found that economic growth is more responsive to oil revenue than non-oil revenue. Based on our findings, we advocate for effective and efficient use of government revenues. Furthermore, since oil revenue fluctuates more than non-oil revenue, we further advocate for creation of an enabling business environment geared towards improving the contribution of the non-oil sector to the government revenue base.

The increasing unemployment in Nigeria has motivated several empirical studies on the causes of the problem in the country. However, attention has not been paid to the contribution of the changes in oil prices to the unemployment problem. As a net exporting oil country, a fluctuation in oil prices in the international market can have impact on economic growth and employment. In the light of this, we investigate the effect of changes in oil prices on unemployment rate in Nigeria, using real oil prices of Brent and West Texas International with linear and nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL) estimation methods. Findings from linear ARDL show that changes in oil prices have little or no significant effects on unemployment rate. The NARDL results indicate that an increase and a decrease in oil prices have an insignificant positive effect on unemployment in the short run. However, in the long run, an increase in oil prices worsens unemployment situation, while a decrease has insignificant reducing effect. We also find evidence of a long-run asymmetric relationship between oil prices and unemployment. The need for government to invest oil revenues in generating more electricity or in providing alternative sources of energy with the objective to reduce the costs of production of firms is recommended.

This study examined the effect of financial development on unemployment in 19 emerging market countries, considering their age groups and gender dichotomy. The data covers the period from 1991–2019. Pooled Ordinary Least Square (OLS), Dynamic OLS, and quantile regression via moments were employed as the estimation methods. Robustness was tested with Fully Modified OLS and Canonical Cointegration Regression (CCR) estimation methods. Our results show that financial development has a conditional mean reducing effect on unemployment and a reducing effect on the distribution of unemployment. However, the reducing effect of financial development on the distribution of unemployment varies across the working-age population and youths. Thus, there is a need to formulate and implement a long-term financial policy to ensure economic growth and guarantee employment for the working-age population and the youths irrespective of gender.