Capital Account Liberalization, Financial Structure, and Access to Credit in Latin America

This article revisits the question of whether capital account liberalization improves access to credit by advancing and testing a theory of how the structure of the financial sector shapes the willingness and ability of banks and governments to repress the domestic financial sector. In a highly concentrated financial sector, banks and governments are more willing to reap the benefits of financial openness by suppressing liberalizing reforms to domestic financial policies, and they can also better coordinate with one another to stifle these reforms compared to when the financial sector is diffuse. Using a panel dataset of Latin American and Caribbean countries, I find that capital account liberalization leads to a decrease in loans to private firms and households and an increase in loans to governments and state-owned enterprises when the financial sector is highly concentrated. Only when the financial sector is diffuse does capital account liberalization lead to reforms in entry barriers, directed credit programs, and banking sector supervision, which extends to improved access to credit for private firms and households.