Capital requirements: a pillar or a burden for bank competitiveness?
This paper examines the relationship between capital requirements, capital ratios and bank competitiveness – measured as profit efficiency. Using data envelopment analysis techniques, profit efficiency scores were estimated for a sample of listed significant institutions directly supervised by the European Central Bank. In calculating the scores, use was made of rich supervisory data on bank-specific characteristics and capital requirements, in addition to macroeconomic variables.