文档介绍：Determinants mercial bank interest margins and profitability:
some international evidence
Asli Demirgüç-Kunt and Harry Huizinga1
First draft: June 1997
Second draft: January 1998
Abstract: Using bank level data for 80 countries in the 1988-1995 period, this paper
shows that differences in interest margins and bank profitability reflect a variety of
determinants: bank characteristics, macroeconomic conditions, explicit and implicit bank
taxation, deposit insurance regulation, overall financial structure, and several underlying
legal and institutional indicators. Controlling for differences in bank activity, leverage, and
the macroeconomic environment, we find that a larger bank asset to GDP ratio and a
lower market concentration ratio lead to lower margins and profits. Foreign banks have
higher margins and pared to domestic banks in developing countries, while the
opposite holds in developed countries. Also, there is evidence that the corporate tax
burden is fully passed on to bank customers.
Keywords: bank profitability, taxation, financial structure
JEL Classification: E44, G21
1 Development Research Group, The World Bank, and Development Research Group, The World Bank
and CentER and Department of Economics, Tilburg University, respectively. The findings,
interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this paper are entirely those of the authors. They do not
necessarily represent the views of the World Bank, its Executive Directors, or the countries they represent.
We thank Jerry Caprio, e Kaufman, Mary Shirley and 1998 AEA session participants ments
and suggestions. We also thank Anqing Shi for excellent research assistance and Paulina Sintim-Aboagye
for help with the manuscript.
1. Introduction
As financial intermediaries, banks play a crucial role in the operation of most
economies. Recent research, as surveyed by Levine (1996), has shown that the efficacy of
financial intermediation can also affect economic growth. Crucially, f