This study contributes to the understanding of the causality between banking credit and economic activity in the Metropolitan Region of São Paulo (MRSP). Questions have been raised as to the prevailing Granger-causality for national economies, and a local approach that has not yet been followed in the empirical literature is pursued here. It is dealt with the relationship between several banking credit modalities and an indicator of economic activity in the MRSP from January 1992 to December 2003, with a bivariate Autoregressive Vector model having found a birectional causality.
local financial development; banking credit; economic activity
