The role of banks to efficiently allocate loans to borrowers is fundamental to a thriving economy. In South Africa this is particularly important, given a challenging socio-economic environment with high levels of unemployment and poor levels of economic growth. This paper investigates the short- and long-run determinants of bank lending behaviour for South African banks.,The study design uses time-series data in an autoregressive distributed-lagged model for the period 1994–2016.,The results indicate that factors such as the volume of deposits and the size of a bank are central to explaining bank lending behaviour in the short run, whereas GDP was found to be the only factor explaining lending behaviour in the long run.,The results suggest that the regulatory role of the South African Reserve Bank to ensure financial stability instils trust and certainty in the banking industry and is reflected in the short-run implications to ensure that large banks are stable and depositors avoid a run on a bank's deposits. This is particularly relevant if the long-run trajectory of the economy is one of sustainable economic growth. Furthermore, although the reserve bank is constantly under threat of not having a pro-growth policy agenda, the results support its role to promote confidence and trust through its financial stability policy. Should confidence in the financisal system not be present, it is argued that systemic risk will be exacerbated through the potential failure of large banks and depositors withdrawing their funds through a run on the bank in the short run. Where financial stability is present, market participants will be more inclined to make deposits into the large South African banks, given the trust and certainty within the system.

中文翻译：

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南非银行贷款行为的短期和长期驱动因素

银行有效地向借款人分配贷款的作用对于繁荣的经济至关重要。在南非，鉴于充满挑战的社会经济环境，高失业率和较差的经济增长水平，这一点尤其重要。本文研究了南非银行的银行贷款行为的短期和长期决定因素。研究设计在1994-2016年期间使用时间序列数据在自回归分布滞后模型中进行研究，结果表明这些因素因为存款的数量和银行的规模是短期内解释银行贷款行为的中心，而GDP却是长期内解释贷款行为的唯一因素，结果表明，南非储备银行为确保金融稳定而发挥的监管作用，在银行业中树立了信任和确定性，并从短期意义上反映出来，以确保大型银行保持稳定，并且存款人避免银行的存款挤兑。 。如果经济的长期轨迹是可持续的经济增长之一，则这尤其重要。此外，尽管储备银行一直面临着缺乏促进增长的政策议程的威胁，但结果支持其通过其金融稳定政策促进信心和信任的作用。有人认为，如果对金融系统不抱有信心，那么大型银行可能会倒闭，而储户在短期内通过挤兑银行提取资金会加剧系统性风险。