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The usefulness of loyalty as a construct for understanding and analysing the market for banking services is here discussed. Using empirical data, the socio‐demographic, attitudinal and behavioural characteristics of loyal versus non‐loyal bank patrons are described. Bank loyalty can be measured and is useful in explaining differences in banking skills, expected benefits and attitudes towards banks and level of utilisation of banking services.

An analysis of domestic and foreign banks’ internal performance by investigating their financial ratios shows that banks in Bahrain, Oman, the United Arab Emirates (GCC countries) have improved their performance over the past several years. Commercial banks in these GCC economies are well capitalised and have adopted modern banking services. Most banks are found to be financially sound by international standards, measured by all key financial ratios. Their operations can be characterised by satisfactory asset quality, more than minimum BIS capital/asset ratio, and high level of profitability. External performance is measured by evaluating banks’ market shares, regulatory compliance and public confidence; and most of the banks show better progress. Harmonization of the banks’ supervisory and accounting systems towards IAS has contributed to the safety and competitiveness of the banking sector.

This chapter explores the political economy of banking in Texas at the turn of the last century. The empirical work sheds light on why Texans voted to allow the chartering of banks by the state government. The evidence shows that county-level voting patterns for state-chartered banks were significantly related to business interests, consumer interests, agricultural activity, and the presence of existing national banks. The work also shows that the first counties to receive the new state banks were associated with higher agricultural activity, larger population size, and the presence of existing national banks. By examining the vote and the location of early entrants in state banking, this chapter contributes to the literature exploring the historical development of state-chartered banking and the dual-banking system in the US.

Quantifies the factors affecting the adoption of Internet banking by Australian consumers. The sample for this survey was drawn from individual residents and business firms in Australia. Shows that security concerns and lack of awareness about Internet banking and its benefits stand out as being the obstacles to the adoption of Internet banking in Australia. Suggests some of the ways to address these impediments. Further suggests that delivery of financial services over the Internet should be a part of overall customer service and distribution strategy. These measures could help in rapid migration of customers to Internet banking, resulting in considerable savings in operating costs for banks.

Describes a study designed to investigate the banking behavior of Islamic bank customers in the state of Bahrain. The study sample comprised 300 customers. A comprehensive profile analysis and a series of chi‐square tests were conducted to reveal key characteristics and patterns: the majority of Islamic bank customers are well educated; approximately 80 per cent are between 25‐50 years of age; more than 50 per cent of the surveyed customers have maintained their current banking relationship with Islamic banks for more than six years; customers’ awareness and usage rates are quite high for savings accounts, current accounts, investment accounts and automated teller machines; customers were found to be most satisfied with the products/services they use most, with the investment accounts receiving the highest satisfaction score; Islamic bank employees received the highest satisfaction score among the elements of the service delivery system; the two most important bank selection criteria were adherence to the Islamic principles, followed by the rate of return.

This paper aims to provide a deeper understanding of the nature and extent of corporate social responsibility (CSR) reporting in the annual report by banking companies in Bangladesh, identify the impact of regulatory change on CSR reporting and examine whether there is any relationship between the extent of CSR reporting and bank characteristics. CSR movement and CSR reporting practices by financial sector have gathered great momentum in recent years. Banking sector is in the leading position in discharging CSR reporting.

The sample composed of all the 30 banking companies enlisted in Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE), and the study used content analysis approach for systematic categorization and analysis of the contents reported in the annual report. A total of 97 CSR items classified into seven classes were selected through a relevant literature review, as the expected items and average, standard deviation, coefficient of variation, percentage and correlation, etc. were used as the tools of analysis. SPSS software version 19.0 was used to analyze the data. An ordinary least square (OLS) regression model is fitted to the data for assessing the effect of independent variables on total CSR reporting score.

The study found that the extent of CSR reporting in banking companies in Bangladesh varies from 27.84 to 65.98 per cent, and on an average, they report 47.39 per cent of the expected CSR items in annual report. It is also observed that banking companies in Bangladesh emphasized on linguistic or written form than charts, graphs or pictures in reporting CSR activities to their stakeholders, and the study found no significant influence of the selected bank characteristics on the extent of CSR reporting. Moreover, the study observed significant impact of regulatory change on nature and extent of CSR reporting.

The study considered all the listed commercial banking companies in Bangladesh, and the annual report of 2011 was taken as the main source of data.

Among others, the implications of the study include the following. Banking companies are expected to get a real scenario of CSR reporting of the banking sector in Bangladesh and banking companies with poor CSR contribution expected to be motivated for contributing more in CSR activities. Government and other regulatory bodies can also get detailed information regarding CSR reporting practices for formulating guidelines in this regard.

This empirical study on the determinants of extent of CSR reporting using a larger number of expected CSR items contributes toward a better understanding of the CSR reporting practices of the banking companies in Bangladesh. The study used a new independent variable “CSR Expenditure” in justifying its influence on CSR reporting and identified the impact of regulatory change on CSR reporting. The study expects contributing in the enactment of more regulatory requirements for bringing the CSR reporting into a certain framework and encouraging in more CSR reporting in Bangladesh.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of bank consolidation and foreign ownership on bank risk taking in the Egyptian banking sector.

Following prior studies (e.g. Yeyati and Micco, 2007; Barry et al., 2011), this study uses pooled Ordinary Least Squares regression models under two main analyses to test the relation between concentration and foreign ownership on one hand and bank risk-taking behavior on the other hand, where observations are pooled across banks and years for the 2000-2011 period. The reform plan was launched in 2004 and resulted in various restructuring activities in the banking system. Thus, to control for the effect of implementing the financial sector reform plan on bank insolvency and credit risk, this study includes a reform dummy variable (RFM) for the post-reform period in models testing the association between consolidation, foreign ownership and bank risk. Therefore, this categorical variable identifies whether bank risk is related to the reform activities that have been observed during the post-restructuring period, 2005-2011. Moreover, to accommodate the possibility that effects of bank concentration and foreign ownership on bank risk differ due to the implementation of the reform plan, the author create two interaction terms: one uses the product of the reform dummy variable and concentration measures, while the other uses the product of the reform dummy and foreign ownership variables to capture interactions. These interaction terms and the dummy variable provide ample room to capture the effect of bank concentration and foreign ownership on bank risks during the post-reform period.

This study provides empirical evidence that bank concentration is associated with low insolvency risk and credit risk as measured by loan loss provisions (LLP) in the post-reform period. These results are consistent with the “concentration-stability” view, suggesting that concentration of the banking sector will enhance stability. Moreover, evidence shows that while a higher presence of foreign banks reduces bank credit risk in the post-reform period, it appears to increase insolvency risk. These results are robust to using alternative measures. These findings imply that regulators in emerging countries should support foreign investments in banks to transfer better managerial skills and systems. However, government-owned banks are found to be more prone to insolvency and credit risks; thus, their ownership should not be encouraged. Finally, policy makers should reinforce bank consolidation, be prudent in determining the capital adequacy ratio (CAR) and monitor intensively less profitable, well-capitalized and small-sized banks.

Consolidation of the banking sector decreases insolvency risk and credit risk, as measured by LLP in the post-reform period. This study proposes that bank supervisors implement prudent polices in determining the bank CAR, and monitor intensively less profitable, well-capitalized and smaller banks, as they have incentives to increase risk. In addition, regulators should encourage foreign investment in the banking sector and facilitate their operations in Egypt.

Bank supervisors should intensely monitor banks with high-CARs that exceed mandatory requirements because they may be more likely to engage in more risk-taking activities.

It provides empirical evidence from a country-specific, emerging market perspective, in which restructuring events affect the national economy. Egypt, similar to other emerging countries in Africa, pursues an institutionally based (bank-based) system of corporate governance, where banks are the primary sources of finance for firms. Therefore, restructuring banks and other financial institutions and supervising their operations ensure the soundness and stability of these institutions, which represent the nerve of emerging economies. Because emerging countries tend to share common characteristics and economic conditions, and the reform of their financial systems is significant for economic development, the Egyptian banking reform and restructuring program should be of interest to other emerging countries to capitalize on this experiment. While international studies on these relationships are mostly cross-country or focus on US banks, firm-specific studies are scant. Furthermore, the findings of this study should be of interest to Egyptian regulators, bank supervisors and policy makers studying the implications of bank reforms.

This study aims to empirically investigate the impact of oil prices, political instability and changes in stability on the bank diversification of the two types of banking systems in the Middle East and North African (MENA) countries.

The study uses bank diversification, stability measurement of probability of default and Zscore by adopting the generalised method of moment for the data between 2007 and 2021. The authors estimate short- and long-run dynamic panel analysis and a robustness test.

The findings reveal that Islamic banks are slightly lower in diversification and stability than conventional peers in the region. Diversification increases with a positive increase in GDP growth, law and order, political stability, bank size, asset quality, oil price, return on equity, profitability and change in banking asset-based stability. The authors found consistency in the two stability measurements in both short- and long-run situations.

Despite the change in banking stability and economic growth and oil prices improved diversification, banks in the region are not diversifying during the crisis period and political instability. Therefore, policymakers should improve mechanisms to monitor the crisis and political unrest to avoid the systemic risk that adversely affects the system through macro-financial linkages in the region.

This study uses change dual stability measurements and oil prices to predict MENA region bank diversification. The authors extended the banking literature by estimating the relationship between crisis periods, political and banking stability, oil prices and other institutional indicators of banking diversification. This study uncovers the effect of the global crisis period on banking diversification and the impact of banking stability changes and validates the models through robustness tests.

During the contraction from 1929 to 1933, the Federal Reserve System tracked changes in the status of all banks operating in the United States and determined the cause of each bank suspension. This chapter introduces that hitherto dormant data and presents aggregate series constructed from it. The new data series will supplement, and in some cases, supplant the data currently used to study banking panics during the period, which were published by the Federal Reserve Board of Governors in 1937.