Search results

There is ample empirical evidence to show that larger banks are more efficient than smaller banks in developed countries. However, there is very little empirical evidence to show that in small developing economies, such as Vietnam, bank size is associated with increased risk, especially credit risk. This paper aim to provide empirical evidence to fill in this gap. This paper employs a slack-based directional distance function using the intermediation approach in measuring the inefficiency of banks in Vietnam during the period 2006–2015. Non-performing loans are used as an undesirable output to capture credit risk. The results show that small banks are more efficient than large banks at the mean level and across the entire distributions of inefficiency of the two groups. Input waste, output shortage and risk surplus of big banks are nearly three times higher than those of small banks. The results are robust under constant and variable returns to scale for production technologies. The study’s empirical results contribute to the ongoing debate on the merits of enlarging bank size in a small transitional economy and suggest that policy makers should pay attention to the risk and inefficiency of large banks to enhance the performance of Vietnam's banking system as a whole.

This paper uses the non-radial slack-based directional technology distance function developed by Färe and Grosskopf (2010) to estimate the efficiency of banks using the data envelopment analysis technique. Data for 44 commercial banks are used.

The empirical results of the paper contribute to the ongoing debate on the merits of enlarging bank size in a small transitional economy and suggest that policy makers should pay attention to the risk and inefficiency of large banks to improve the performance of Vietnam's banking system as a whole.

This paper extends the extant literature by examining whether efficiency is associated with size in a typical transitional developing economy. The classic Cournot model, the structure-conduct-performance and the efficiency structure hypotheses state that larger banks are more efficient than smaller banks (Bikker and Bos, 2008). Empirical studies of Berger (2003), Mester (2005), Wheelock and Wilson (2012) lend support to the statement in developed countries. However, not much empirical literature focuses on small developing economies such as Vietnam to show that bank size is associated with increased risk, especially credit risk. The study’s empirical results show that size enlargement is not positively associated with risk-adjusted efficiency. Input waste, output shortage and risk surplus of big banks are nearly three times higher than those of small banks. The results are robust under constant and variable returns to scale for production technologies.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the performance of the agricultural banking industry using both traditional and risk‐adjusted non‐parametric efficiency measurement techniques. In addition to computing efficiency scores, the risk preference structure of the agricultural banking industry is examined.

The paper used data envelopment analysis (DEA) to examine the efficiency of agricultural banks in the year 2001. Standard cost efficiency is computed and compared to both profit and risk‐adjusted profit efficiency scores. The risk‐adjustment is a modification of traditional DEA wherein firm preferences are represented via a mean‐variance criterion. The risk‐adjusted technique also provides estimates of firm level risk aversion.

Results from the traditional approach that does not account for risk indicate a low degree of efficiency in the banking industry, while the risk‐adjusted approach indicates banks are much more efficient. On average, 77 percent of the inefficiency identified by the standard DEA formulation is actually attributable to risk averse behavior by the firm. In addition, most banks appear to be substantially risk averse.

The risk‐adjusted DEA technique used in this study should be applied to other, diverse data sets to examine its performance in a broader context.

Results from this study support the idea that traditional DEA methods may mischaracterize the level of efficiency in the data if agents are risk averse. In addition, the paper outlines a practical method for deriving firm level risk aversion coefficients.

This paper sheds light on the agricultural banking industry and illustrates the power of a new efficiency and risk analysis technique.

This study aims to identify the efficiency scores of hospitals affiliated to the Ministry of Health in Turkey between the years of 2010–2015 at provincial level and to reveal the factors that affect the efficiency scores.

The two-stage data envelopment analysis (DEA) method was used to achieve the study purpose. In the first stage, DEA method based on input-oriented Charnes–Cooper–Rhodes (CCR) model was performed to calculate the efficiency scores of public hospitals at the provincial level between 2010 and 2015, and in the second stage, Tobit regression and linear regression analyses were used to identify whether the efficiency scores of provinces are affected by the input, output and control variables.

Upon the analysis, the average efficiency scores of 81 provinces by years were found to vary between 0.79 and 0.89. According to both regression analyses, all of the input and output variables were found to have significant effects on the efficiency scores of provinces while only the population of province among the control variables was identified as the factor with an effect on the efficiency scores of provinces (p < 0.05).

The results of this study are thought to guide health policymakers and managers in terms of both determining efficient and inefficient hospitals at the provincial level and revealing which variables should be taken into account in order to increase efficiency.

The study differs from previous studies on the efficiency of hospitals. First, although previous studies were generally descriptive studies to determine the efficiency level of hospitals, this study is an analytical study that tries also to show the factors affecting the efficiency of hospitals. In addition, while examining the effect of input and output variables on efficiency scores, control variables were also included in the study.

The purpose of this paper is to incorporate risk in technical efficiency of ASEAN banks in a panel data framework for the period 2000 to 2015.

The directional distance function and semi-parametric framework are employed to estimate efficiency scores for two scenarios, one with only good outputs and the other with a combination of good and bad outputs.

The findings show there is no evidence of technological progress for banks in ASEAN and concerns about the outperformance of Vietnam’s banks. In addition, performance of Vietnam’s banks tends to be distorted by low level of loan loss reserves.

To reflect the true performance and shorten the period of removing bad assets, the State Bank of Vietnam can request banks in Vietnam to book more loan loss reserves.

By examining such a new approach, this study makes an early attempt to incorporate credit risk into the banking efficiency in ASEAN region.

The purpose of this study is twofold. First, this research estimates banks' efficiencies from the perspectives of resource utilization and investment after incorporating risk measures as an exogenous input in the investment-efficiency stage. Second, the current study examines the relationship between intellectual capital (IC) and banks' efficiencies.

First, this study uses a dynamic network data envelopment analysis approach in investigating the efficiencies of 24 Taiwanese banks in 2007–2018 from two perspectives. Second, this research utilizes various regression techniques, namely, ordinary least squares (OLS), robust least squares and truncated regression, to gauge the impact of IC on banks' efficiencies. Typically, IC is determined based on a monetary value-based measure and value-added intellectual coefficient (VAICTM).

Resource-utilization (investment) efficiencies were observed as 0.941 (0.964), thereby contributing to the mean overall efficiency of the sample banks at 0.952. However, the related efficiency changes decline over the sample period, thereby suggesting that the average banks' efficiencies hardly increase. Regression analyses show a significantly positive relationship between IC and banks' overall resource-utilization and investment efficiencies.

Overall, this study suggests that researchers should consider risks when estimating banks' efficiencies owing to their connection to banks' investment performance. From banks' dynamic two-stage efficiencies, this study demonstrated that investments in IC will bring improved future economic benefits.

Different from prior studies, this study improves banks' efficiency evaluation models by incorporating risk measures and assuming weighted periods for the 2007–2008 global financial crisis. Moreover, the use of monetary value-based measure of IC provides consistent results as the commonly-used VAICTM does.

Comparing conventional data envelopment analysis (DEA) model with contemporary Seiford and Zhu model, this study aims to evaluate the technical efficiency (TE) of Indian banks from 1998/99 to 2016/17 in the presence of non-performing loans (NPLs).

To examine TE, this study has considered a novel approach, i.e. linear monotone decreasing transformation as suggested by Seiford and Zhu (2002), which treats undesirable output as a desirable output in the framework of Charnes, Cooper and Rhodes (CCR)-based output-oriented DEA approach. In particular, to remove the biasness from the estimated efficiency scores, Simar Wilson (1998, Algorithm #1) has been applied, which is perhaps the first attempt in this kind of literature till now. This study further tries to investigate the notion of sigma and unconditional β-convergence in TE using two-step system generalized method of moments model in dynamic panel framework.

Treatment of NPLs using conventional DEA model misinterprets the TE scores, while a true picture emerges when the NPLs are correctly accounted as an undesirable output in banks’ loans production process. Efficiency has declined during the crisis years, but it recovered immediately after the crisis years in India. However, a sudden and steep deterioration in efficiency scores has been seen from 2013 till the most recent study period. Public sector banks and old private banks have reported higher average efficiency scores than new private banks (NPBs) and foreign banks (FBs) in India. However, FBs are the only commercial banks that maintained their efficiency levels during crisis years in India. This study also saw the persistence and presence of σ-convergence phenomena in TE for Indian banks, reflecting the ability to reach up to “Catch-up” phenomenon owing to the lower dispersion and persistence of convergence in TE by the Indian banks.

The actual efficiency score can only be estimated when the NPL will be considered as an undesirable output rather than a desirable output when designing the loan production process of banks. Although the ownership clusters of all commercial banks in India need to formulate stricter policies to increase the level of assets quality and efficiency, but, NPBs need to pay some more efforts in this direction. This study’s outcome has the potential to provide useful information for regulators and policymakers, which suggests that in which direction or in which clusters improvement are needed to raise the level of asset quality and technical efficiency in the coming years.

For a long time, there has been the existence of trade-offs between researchers, like which is the best model for accounting for NPLs? Traditional or contemporary? Thus, our study aims to add knowledge to the limited stock of NPL modelling in the efficiency literature. Dynamic convergence in TE scores in Indian banks has yet not to be tested, which is another novelty of the study.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of diversification on profitability, profit efficiency and financial stability of Ghanaian banks.

The authors employed a panel regression technique on a data set of 32 banks from 2000 to 2015. The data envelopment analysis is used to compute profit efficiency scores with credit risk accounted for.

The results suggest that income diversification decreases profit, profit efficiency and financial stability. The impact on profit and stability is U-shaped. The impact of asset diversification was found to be insignificant. High competition reduces both profitability and profit efficiency which is inconsistent with the quiet-life hypothesis of Hicks (1935), but financial stability increases with competition. High investment in tangible assets is associated with poor performance. Non-banking financial institutions that later became universal banks are not financially stable. Competition, size, age, government ownership and leverage which are controlled for and a sensitivity analysis conducted also provided relevant insights.

The results are relevant in understanding the events in the Ghanaian banking industry in 2017–2018. Income diversification strategy is essential in determining the performance of banks. Management has to figure out the extent and scope of their diversification to benefit from the strategy.

The authors examined diversification from the view-point of both the income statement and statement of financial position while most prior studies focused on only one aspect. The study is one of the few studies that employed the risk-adjusted profit efficiency measure in Sub-Saharan Africa.

By incorporating the role of nonperforming loans (NPLs), the study aims to assess the impact of global financial crisis (GFC) on the intermediation efficiency of Indian banks for the period of 1998/99 to 2016/17.

To obtain efficiency level of Indian banks, this study applied sequential data envelopment analysis (DEA) based directional distance function (DDF) approach, which performed simultaneous expansion of desirable output and reduction of undesirable output in the bank's loan production structure. Additionally, using fixed effect regression approach in the panel data framework, this study assesses both the phenomenon of σ- and unconditional β-efficiency convergence in public sector banks (PSBs), private banks (PBs), foreign banks (FBs) and overall scheduled commercial banks (SCBs) during the pre-crisis, crisis and post-crisis years in India.

Irrespective of the bank's production model, the evidence suggests that the accounting NPLs as an undesirable output significantly deteriorating the intermediation technical efficiency levels of Indian banks, especially after the crisis years until the last year of the study period. This reflects that Indian banks failed more to achieve their financial intermediation objective in the post-crisis years as compared to the crisis and pre-crisis years. In-depth, statistical evidence of commercial bank ownership groups reveals that public sector banks exhibit a higher level of efficiency in pursuance of traditional loan-based activity followed by private and foreign banks. The study also found the existence of sigma convergence in technical efficiency levels of Indian banks and ownership groups as well.

This study is perhaps the first one, which present the robust evolution of Indian banks intermediation efficiency by taking into account both endogenous (i.e. NPLs as an undesirable output and equity as a quasi-fixed input in the bank production process) crisis and exogenous (i.e. global financial and economic stress) crises. Moreover, none of the existing studies have conducted sub-period wise analysis to show the apparent occurrence of both convergence properties in technical efficiency, adding novelty in the literature.

The present study assesses the commercial bank profit efficiency and its relationship to banking sector competition in a rapidly growing emerging economy, India from 2009 to 2019 using stochastic frontier analysis (SFA).

Lerner indices, conventional and efficiency-adjusted, quantify competition. Two SFA models are employed to calculate alternative profit efficiency (inefficiency) scores: the two-step time-decay approach proposed by Battese and Coelli (1992) and the recently developed single-step pairwise difference estimator (PDE) by Belotti and Ilardi (2018). In the first step of the BC92 framework, profit inefficiency is calculated, and in the second step, Tobit and Fractional Regression Model (FRM) are utilized to evaluate profit inefficiency correlates. PDE concurrently solves the frontier and inefficiency equations using the maximum likelihood process.

The results suggest that foreign banks are less profit efficient than domestic equivalents, supporting the “home-field advantage” hypothesis in India. Further, increasing competition drives bank managers to make riskier lending and investment choices, decreasing bank profit efficiency. However, this effect varies depending on bank ownership and size.

Literature on the competition bank efficiency link is conspicuously scant, with a focus on technical and cost efficiency. Less is known regarding the influence of competition on bank profit efficiency. The article is one of the first to examine commercial bank profit efficiency and its relationship to banking sector competition. Additionally, the study work represents one of the first applications of the FRM presented by Papke and Wooldridge (1996) and the PDE provided by Belotti and Ilardi (2018).

In light of the current debate on bank capital requirements, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the relative impact of capitalization on risk‐taking efficiency in Islamic and conventional banks. The author tests whether changes occurring to the capital structure of such different types of intermediaries unevenly affect their behaviour in terms of risk‐taking efficiency.

The paper conducts an empirical analysis using data for the period 2001‐2011 by means of both standard regression methods and stochastic cost frontier techniques.

Results provide evidence that more capitalized Islamic banks are associated to less risky positions in terms of their asset structure. In particular, the latter exhibit higher liquidity standards and a lower incidence of non‐performing loans compared to other banks. This has delayed positive effects on profitability and no substantial impact on efficiency. On the other hand, highly capitalized conventional banks tend to shift from more traditional lending activities to investment in other (profit generating) assets. Such strategy increases profitability and efficiency, although raising impaired loans.

This study does not address potential endogeneity concerns that might affect the variables at stake, hence mainly providing indications in terms of correlation between phenomena rather than causality.

The analysis has important practical implications when considering capital adequacy as a regulatory tool for managing the risk of Islamic banks' activity, following principles similar to those recommended by the Basel committee.

The original contribution of the paper to the literature consists of comparing the effects of capitalization in different types of banks, and results can be usefully exploited by policymakers wishing to tailor banking regulation on the specific model of banking they are entitled to regulate.