The nexus between Basel capital requirements, risk-taking and profitability: what about emerging economies?

The study examines the nexus between Basel capital requirements, banking sector risk-taking, and profitability in Asian emerging markets by using dynamic panel GMM methodology. The findings of the study suggest that regulatory capital positively affects risk-taking which validates the “regulatory hypothesis.” The findings also reveal that regulatory capital positively while risk negatively affects the profitability in the banking sector. The current study finds the bidirectional causality between the regulatory capital and risk-taking, implying that banks with higher capital ratios are expected to increase in risk-taking and vice versa. The findings also suggest that managerial ownership positively affects while foreign ownership negatively impacts risk-taking consistent with the agency theory of corporate governance. The study proposes that ownership structure has a significant influence on bank risk and profitability, however, the combined impact of regulatory capital through its interaction with the ownership structure is not proved to be significant.