LAUSR

This paper aims to analyzes the English-language literature related to Systemically Important Banks (SIBs) by applying the bibliometric methodology to present the current state of SIBs’ intellectual structure and emerging trends from a large quantity of data for the period 2002 to first 2 months of 2022 from Scopus, which is which is considered the most widely used database. SIBs are large and powerful, their contribution to economic growth is significant but their failure is usually systematic and contagious. Regulators subsidize them with public money to avoid systematic financial crises. It is striking that smaller banks do not receive the same treatment, which places them under competitive disadvantage. The bibliometric methodology helps in focusing on this issue for being a rigorous way for exploring and evaluating large volumes of data, identifying gaps, deriving unique research ideas, and resulting in a significant research impact. Therefore, we apply the bibliometric analysis to describe the field’s evolution and structure, including co-authorship, bibliographical coupling, and co-citation. The findings reveal that, the USA is the most relevant country, the University of Southeast is the most relevant institution, and the Journal of Banking and Finance is the most relevant journal. We contribute to the literature mainly by: (1) identifying the benchmark authors, locations of SIBs, and journals; (2) specifying the research streams and summarizing the most cited papers; and (3) identifying the research gaps and future directions.