Investigating the nonlinear nexus between natural resources, digitization, economic policy uncertainty, and financial structure in Canada

Shahid Iqbal, Mustafa Tevfik Kartal (), Xuetong Wang () and Sami Ullah
Additional contact information
Shahid Iqbal: Guangzhou University
Mustafa Tevfik Kartal: European University of Lefke
Xuetong Wang: Guangzhou University
Sami Ullah: Northeast Petroleum University

Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, 2025, vol. 12, issue 1, 1-14

Abstract: Abstract The relationship between natural resource abundance and financial structure remains a contested issue, with the existing literature divided between the resource curse and resource blessing hypotheses. However, few studies examine how external macro-institutional factors shape this nexus. This study fills that gap by investigating how digitization (TNI), economic policy uncertainty (EPU), regulatory quality (RQ), and inflation (INF) influence the impact of natural resources (NRs) on financial structure, using Canada as a representative case of a developed, resource-rich economy. Quarterly data from 1990 to 2022 are analyzed using Wavelet Quantile Regression (WQR) and validated with Quantile-on-Quantile Regression (QQR) to account for asymmetries and nonlinearity. The results support the resource blessing hypothesis, indicating that natural resources have a positive impact on financial structure, particularly when complemented by digitization and policy stability. These findings suggest that Canada’s institutional capacity and digital transformation efforts enhance its ability to leverage natural wealth. The study recommends policies that integrate digital infrastructure and institutional quality improvements to strengthen financial systems in resource-dependent economies.

Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1057/s41599-025-05849-x Abstract (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:palcom:v:12:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1057_s41599-025-05849-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/palcomms/about

DOI: 10.1057/s41599-025-05849-x

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Humanities and Social Sciences Communications from Palgrave Macmillan
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().