Financial Intermediation and Growth of the Nigerian Economy: An Insurance Sector Perspective, 1986 - 2018

The purpose of this study was to investigate the financial intermediation and growth linkage in the Nigerian Economy with focus on the Insurance sector covering the period 1981 to 2018. Annual time series from Central Bank Statistical Bulletin was employed following an ex-post facto research design and using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag Model (ARDL) for empirical analyses. It was found that insurance premium and insurance claims significantly affected the growth rate of the economy. It is therefore recommended that the intermediation roles of the financial system should be encouraged and due attention given to the hitherto neglected insurance sector to allow for all-inclusive growth.