errors. In addition, we test the robustness of our baseline results to outliers by running robust regression estimation that proportionally underweights the information from leverage points (outliners) in the regression estimation. Further, since our alternative measure of access to deposits based on Demirguc-Kunt and Klapper (2012) is dated by 2011, and because GDP growth could also suffer an endogeneity problem, we estimate the regression model by GMM in addition. In this case, we use the Honohan (2008) index based on data from 2005 as an instrument for the 2011 Demirguc-Kunt and Klapper’s index, and the log of GDP at the peak of deposit growth prior to the crisis as an instrument for GDP growth during the period when the maximum drop of deposit growth occurred in each country. We have used the rule of thumb of Stock, Wright and Yogo (2002) and Stock and Yogo (2005) to check that our instruments are relevant and our GMM regression does not suffer from the weak instrument problem.

# **4. Data Description**

This paper examines the relationship between access to deposits and the stability of bank deposits during the 2008 global financial crisis. We thus focus on analyzing the dynamics of bank deposit growth between 2006-2010, which covers both pre-crisis years and post-crisis years. We calculate year on year growth rate on bank deposits for 173 countries using data on outstanding deposits of commercial banks from IMF’s Financial Access Survey (FAS) database. We choose this indicator over other measures of total deposits to ensure maximum cross sectional coverage (number of countries covered) and best consistency across countries. We observed that it is rarely the case that the year on year deposit growth rate remained stable and many countries experienced more than one peak or more than one trough during the period that we examine. In order to capture the potential impact of the 2008 crisis, we define maximum drop in deposit growth in the following manner: first, we document the minimum deposit growth a country experienced between 2007 and 2010 and mark the year when it occurred; then we find the maximum deposit growth the country had experienced before this year. The difference between this maximum deposit growth and the minimum deposit growth then constitutes the maximum drop in deposit growth—our cross-country dependent variable.

We use the composite indicator of access to financial services constructed by Honohan (2008) as a proxy for access to deposits. The actual use of deposits in each country is approximated by the indicator “percentage of adult population who saved at a formal financial institution in the past year” from the Global Financial Inclusion Database (Demirguc-Kunt and Klapper (2012)).<sup>2</sup> Detailed descriptions of variables, data sources, and data availability are listed in Table A1.

> 2 Earlier attempts at measuring access to bank deposits include Beck, Demirguc-Kunt, and Martinez Peria (2007). We do not use this measure as it is available for a much smaller number of countries and because it is highly correlated with deposits over GDP, which we use as a control, and that would introduce a serious multi-colinearity problem.

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