This study aims to analyze the impact of the development and stability of the financial sector on economic growth on the basis of the quantitative methods that produce robust results. The following research hypotheses are tested: /H1/ The relationship between financial sector development (stability) and economic growth is nonlinear; /H2/ An excessively large size of the financial system does not lead to more rapid economic growth: it may even negatively affect GDP dynamics; /H3/ The inclusion of the post-crisis period gives new insights of the nature of the relationship between financial system and economic growth. The analysis covers the 28 EU and 34 OECD economies and the 1993-2013 period. The following variables are used to measure the financial sector: domestic credit provided by financial sector, bank nonperforming loans, bank capital to assets ratio, market capitalization of listed companies, turnover ratio of stocks traded, and the monetization ratio. A new element of the empirical analysis is the application of the extended econometric and economic modelling, including testing nonlinear relationships, analyzing both levels and changes of the financial variables, as well as estimating the models on the basis of a moving panel with overlapping observations. The regression equations are estimated by Blundell and Bond's GMM system estimator. Our results indicate that all the research hypotheses have been positively verified.

The aim of this study is a detailed analysis of real economic convergence in 27 former socialist (or transition) countries. We focus on two concepts of convergence: absolute (unconditional) beta convergence and sigma convergence. The time frame of our study is 1990–2005. We provide a broad empirical picture of convergence. First, we analyse the catching-up process in the whole group of 27 countries as well as in several narrower sub-groups. Second, we carry out our calculations for the entire period 1990–2005 as well as for shorter sub-periods.

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