Two Centuries of Systemic Bank Runs
Bank runs play a key role for the allocation of resources in the economy by providing long-term loans funded by shorter-term deposits. Maturity transformation gives rise to a critical vulnerability: the possibility of bank runs. Despite much interest from both academics and practitioners over the past decades, measuring bank runs systematically has proven to be notoriously difficult.
In "Two Centuries of Systemic Bank Runs", we produce the most comprehensive, historical, narrative chronology of bank runs covering 192 countries over 1800-2024. In addition, we assemble and harmonize a novel dataset of national banking sectors’ deposits, allowing us to measure episodes of significant deposit contractions. The synergy of qualitative, narrative-based identification of bank runs with a quantitative, statistical indicator of depositor withdrawals provides an unprecedented advancement in the measurement of bank run risk.
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Cite as: Jamilov, R., Konig, T., Muller, K., and Saidi, F. "Two Centuries of Systemic Bank Runs", CEPR Discussion Paper 19382, 2025.
Bank Runs and Crises: 1800-2024
Source: Jamilov et al. (2025). Note: The figures plot the frequencies of bank runs for which JKMS have narrative evidence and a unified banking crises measure from 1800 to 2024. The annual frequency of runs and crises is visualized as a moving average, using a ten-year time window. The frequency in each individual year is calculated as the total number of runs/crises divided by the number of countries for which the authors have data coverage in that specific year.