Munni Begum

In this paper, we examine the impact of trade openness on bank risk-taking behavior employing a panel dataset of 899 banks from the BRICS (i.e., Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) countries over the period 2000–2017. We find that higher trade openness lowers bank risk-taking. Our results are robust when we use alternative proxies of trade openness and bank risk-taking, estimate country-wise regressions, or use alternative estimation methods such as system Generalized Methods of Moments (GMM), fixed effects, pooled Ordinary Least Square (OLS), and Vector Error Correction Model (VECM) models. We also observe higher trade openness decreases bank risk-taking in both the short and long run. Moreover, banks in more open countries perform relatively better during the crisis period further signifying the diversification benefits of openness. Together, our findings imply the beneficial impact of trade openness for financial sector stability.

Over last two decades, emerging and developing nations have desperately endeavored for efficient banking sectors. In this study, we argue that bank efficiency generates incentives that can impact banks’ capital holdings and the cost of financial intermediation. Analyzing a panel dataset of 1190 banks from BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) countries over the period 2007–2015, we find robust evidence that more efficient banks hold higher capital and charge lower financial intermediation costs. In an extended sample over the period 2000–2015, we observe that cost efficiency had a marginal positive impact on bank capital during the global financial crisis of 2007–2009. We also observe that on average, banks increased the cost of financial intermediation during the crisis, however, greater efficiency helped banks to not charge higher intermediation costs. Our results imply the beneficial impact of bank efficiency for bank stability and real economy.

In response to the recent global financial crisis, the regulatory authorities in many countries have imposed stringent capital requirements in the form of the BASEL III Accord to ensure financial stability. On the other hand, bankers have criticized new regulation on the ground that it would enhance the cost of funds for bank borrowers and deteriorate the bank profitability. In this study, we examine the impact of capital requirements on the cost of financial intermediation and bank profitability using a panel dataset of 32 Bangladeshi banks over the period from 2000 to 2015. By employing a dynamic panel generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator, we find robust evidence that higher bank regulatory capital ratios reduce the cost of financial intermediation and increase bank profitability. The results hold when we use equity to total assets ratio as an alternative measure of bank capital. We also observe that switching from BASEL I to BASEL II has no measurable impact on the cost of financial intermediation and bank profitability in Bangladesh. In the empirical analysis, we further observe that higher bank management and cost efficiencies are associated with the lower cost of financial intermediation and higher bank profitability. These results have important implications for bank regulators, academicians, and bankers.