How Large Is Broad Money Relative to GDP? (2025)

Broad money as a share of GDP compares a wide measure of liquid financial instruments with annual economic output. In the World Bank WDI series FM.LBL.BMNY.GD.ZS, 74 countries and areas have an observation dated 2025. Their simple median is 59.56% and their unweighted mean is 73.25%. Hong Kong SAR is the highest same-year observation at 481.00%, while Angola is the lowest at 13.79%.

Broad money is wider than cash in circulation

The World Bank defines broad money as liquid financial instruments held by money-holding sectors that are widely accepted as a medium of exchange, plus instruments that can be converted into a medium of exchange at short notice at or close to full nominal value. It therefore goes beyond notes and coins and includes deposits and other sufficiently liquid claims.

Broad money should not automatically be treated as identical to a country-specific headline such as M2. National financial structures and statistical classifications differ. For a consistent cross-country comparison, this article uses only the World Bank FM.LBL.BMNY.GD.ZS series rather than mixing national monetary aggregates with different definitions.

The 2025 median across 74 observations is 59.56%

Giving each 2025 country or area equal weight produces a median of 59.56% and a simple mean of 73.25%. The first quartile is 42.29% and the third quartile is 86.89%. The mean sits about 13.69 percentage points above the median because the upper tail includes exceptionally large values such as Hong Kong SAR. This is an unweighted descriptive average, not a GDP-weighted global monetary ratio.

The largest band is 30% to under 60%, with 29 observations (39.2%). Another 24 fall from 60% to under 100%. A total of 12 observations are at or above 100%, so a ratio above annual GDP is not an isolated statistical oddity.

A ratio above 100% is not automatically an error

Broad money is stock-like: it measures liquid financial claims accumulated and held at a point or over an accounting reference. GDP is a flow of newly produced value over a year. Comparing a financial stock with an annual flow naturally allows the ratio to exceed 100%. A value of 150% does not mean that an economy “created 150% of GDP in new money” during the year; it means the measured broad-money balance is roughly one and a half times annual GDP.

A high ratio may be associated with a large deposit base and deep financial intermediation, but it is not a score of financial quality and it does not by itself imply high inflation. Explaining why a country is high or low requires additional evidence on money growth, credit, inflation, interest rates, exchange rates, financial institutions and asset holdings.

Hong Kong, Japan and Macao lead the 2025 same-year set

The three highest 2025 observations are Hong Kong SAR at 481.00%, Japan at 246.78% and Macao SAR at 201.21%. Hong Kong is above 480% of GDP and stands far above the second-highest value. Mauritius follows at 142.32%, Australia at 133.12% and Nepal at 131.21%.

The map also shows large differences within Asia. Japan is at 246.78%, Malaysia at 120.64% and Cambodia at 124.80%, while Indonesia is at 42.54%. Geographic proximity therefore does not imply a similar monetary structure or similar accumulation of liquid financial assets.

Low ratios should not be treated as a direct measure of financial exclusion

The lowest 2025 observations include Angola at 13.79%, Niger at 17.32%, Uzbekistan at 20.47%, South Sudan at 21.02% and Uganda at 22.30%. These values only show that measured broad money is small relative to GDP. They do not directly measure account ownership, cash shortages, access to formal finance or the importance of non-bank and informal financial channels.

South America provides another clear contrast within the same reference year: Brazil is at 118.23%, Argentina at 26.28%, Colombia at 43.06% and Uruguay at 51.47%. Such neighboring differences are exactly what the map is useful for identifying, but they are not proof that one country has a better monetary system than another.

Korea’s latest retained value is 162.71% in 2024

The Republic of Korea’s latest retained observation is 162.71% in 2024, while China is 227.67% in 2024. Japan (246.78%) and the United States (99.72%) have 2025 observations. Korea and China are therefore shown in the latest-value table but are not inserted into the synchronized 2025 ranking.

Why the 166 latest values are not ranked as if they were one year

The latest non-null file contains 166 countries and areas, but their reference years span 1989 to 2025. There are 74 observations from 2025, 41 from 2024 and 10 from 2023. Some latest values are much older: Canada is 2008, Switzerland is 2016 and Singapore is 2020. The map, median, mean and high/low ranking therefore use only the 74 observations actually dated 2025.

How this differs from bank deposits as a share of GDP

Bank-deposits-to-GDP indicators focus on deposits held at deposit-taking institutions, such as demand, time and saving deposits. Broad money is conceptually wider because it includes currency and other liquid financial instruments that can function as, or be converted quickly into, a medium of exchange. The two measures may move together, but they are not interchangeable and should not be expected to have identical values.

Broad money is also different from private-sector-credit-to-GDP measures. Broad money looks at liquid financial assets held by money-holding sectors, while private credit looks at financial institutions’ claims on borrowers. They illuminate different sides of the financial system balance sheet.

How to use the broad-money-to-GDP map

First, use the synchronized map to identify large bands such as below 30%, 60–100% or above 100%. Second, check whether a country of interest is actually in the same reference year before comparing decimal-level rankings. Third, pair the ratio with money growth, deposits, private credit, inflation and interest rates when trying to understand why the level is high or low.

The ratio should not be used as a stand-alone inflation signal. It measures the level of broad money relative to GDP, not the annual growth rate of money. A country can have a high stock ratio without experiencing the same inflation outcome as another country with a similar ratio. Inflation analysis requires separate price and money-growth data over time.

Data source and calculation method

The data come from the World Bank World Development Indicators series Broad money (% of GDP), code FM.LBL.BMNY.GD.ZS. World Bank metadata defines broad money as liquid instruments widely accepted as a medium of exchange plus instruments convertible into a medium of exchange at short notice and near full nominal value. The listed source institutions include the IMF International Financial Statistics database, the World Bank WDI database and OECD national accounts files.

The analysis retains all 166 latest non-null country or area observations for reference, but all main summary statistics and rankings use only the 74 rows dated 2025. Missing values are not converted to zero and older observations are not relabeled as 2025. The median, mean, quartiles and band counts are calculated directly from that synchronized 2025 subset.

Frequently Asked Questions

Related Articles

Bank Deposits as a Share of GDP: World Map by Country

How Large Are Financial-System Deposits Relative to GDP? (2021)

How Much Do Bank Lending Rates Vary by Country? (2025)