Predicting Global Financial Meltdown and Systemic Banking Failure

Abstract

The last two decades of international financial history have witnessed an unprecedented increase in the number of episodes of financial distress; wherein the incidence of these episodes has not been restricted to national boundaries as localised systemic incidents but have instead been spread to other countries and across regions in the form of financial contagion. This book chapter proposes a detailed discussion and analysis of the scholarly and practitioner literature used to conceptualise and to encapsulate the theoretical construct of an Early Warning System (EWS) developed to predict and mitigate the onset and persistence of systemic banking failures and financial crises. The models that constitute the focus of this overview are pivotal to the prediction of systemic banking meltdowns, either on their own or as constituent elements of other methodological approaches that contribute significantly towards the design and development of an Early Warning System.