Green Financial Innovations and Sustainable Economic Development: Evidence from Emerging Economies

Green financial innovations have the potential for mobilizing financial resources towards environmental and inclusive sustainable development. Green financial innovation includes green bonds, climate resilient financial products, fintech-based environmental, social, and governance platforms. These platforms facilitate the allocation of capital towards green and sustainable investment, which provisions the transition to promote environmentally sustainable practices and sustainable economic development (SED). The financial development and access to financial services contribute to improving resource allocation, mobilizing savings, facilitating investment, and expanding access to financial opportunities. Since the emerging economies are facing the dual challenge of environmental pressures and SED, the fundamental objective of this research is to explore the role of green financial innovation, financial development, information, and communication technology (ICT and renewable energy consumption (REC) on SED in selected emerging economies. This study concentrated on panel data ranging from 1990 to 2022 to investigate sustainable economic development in selected countries. The Generalized Method of Movements (GMM) is used for empirical analysis as it provides remedial measure for presence of serial correlation and endogeneity. Based on empirics, green financial innovation has positive and significant effect on SED in emerging countries. Moreover, it is observed that financial development, REC, ICT, international tourism, trade openness, and foreign direct investment exert positive and significant impact on SED. However, this research identified that natural resource abundance and aging population dependency variables have negative and significant effect on SED. Concluding, this research suggested that financial institutions should devised regulatory frameworks and hybrid models to support green finance through innovative financial products, digital banking, fintech solutions, and services. Likewise, central banks should prioritize strategies that enhance financial development, increase the availability of green financial resources, and ensure efficient mechanisms for directing capital towards renewable tech-driven industries.