Macroeconomic Determinants of Investment Credit in Indonesia: Evidence from the ARDL Bounds Testing Approach

Abstract

Investment credit plays an important role in financing productive activities and sustaining Indonesia's economic development. Nevertheless, limited empirical evidence is available regarding how fluctuations in gold prices together with other macroeconomic indicators influence investment credit during the post-pandemic period. This study investigates the effects of gold prices, the USD/IDR exchange rate, the Industrial Production Index (IPI), the BI 7-Day Reverse Repo Rate, and inflation on investment credit using monthly observations from June 2016 to December 2024. An Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) model combined with an Error Correction Model (ECM) is employed to evaluate both long-run associations and short-run adjustments. The empirical findings reveal that the variables are cointegrated, implying the existence of a stable long-term equilibrium. However, none of the estimated long-run coefficients is statistically distinguishable from zero at conventional significance levels. In the short run, exchange rate movements generate the largest response in investment credit, whereas industrial production and the policy interest rate produce relatively modest effects. The error-correction coefficient is negative and statistically significant, indicating that temporary departures from equilibrium are gradually eliminated over time. These findings suggest that investment credit in Indonesia is driven primarily by short-term macroeconomic adjustments rather than persistent long-run effects of individual macroeconomic variables.