Shadow banking comprises a set of non-bank financial intermediaries such as pension funds, investment funds, insurance companies, and other non-bank financial intermediaries that function similarly to traditional banks in terms of performance but are not supervised by the central bank. Given the expansion of shadow banking activities and its impact on real sectors of the economy, this research aims to investigate the effect of shadow banking on the size of government in selected countries (including two groups of developed and developing countries).Methods: This research was conducted using the Panel Vector Autoregression (VAR) model over the period 2002-2022 in selected countries. Results: The results obtained for the group of developed countries indicate that the expansion of shadow banking assets has not led to an increase in the size of government. However, conversely, according to the research findings for the group of developing countries, there is a positive relationship between shadow banking and the size of government. That is, the expansion of shadow banking assets in the group of developing countries has resulted in an increase in the size of government.Conclusions In this study, the impact of shadow banking on the size of government in selected countries has been examined using the Panel VAR model. The results indicate that the expansion of shadow banking assets in developed countries has not led to an increase in the size of government. However, conversely, in developing countries, the expansion of shadow banking assets has led to an increase in the size of government
