Purpose The purpose of this paper is to study the determinants of Asian banks’ profitability with particular focus on the role of asset quality. This concern has been particularly important as the Basel III imposed more stringent requirements in banking regulation. Design/methodology/approach The paper uses fixed effect estimation for the panel data of the sample that consists of 947 banks from 12 Asian economies over the period of 2001-2015. Findings The authors find that poor asset quality (measured as impaired loans over gross loans) has a significant negative impact on banks’ profitability. Other bank-specific variables – capital adequacy, income diversification and operating inefficiency – are also important determinants. With regard to macroeconomic factors – real gross domestic product growth has most significant influence on the performance of banks. Research limitations/implications The authors also find that the banks operating in non-advanced economies enjoy higher profit margin than banks operating in advanced economies. Practical implications Although the average asset quality in Asian banks improved over the years, governments could promote more competition, particularly in non-advanced economies. Banks in the region are recommended to diversify their income by avoiding over reliance on interest income. Originality/value Although there are prior studies that looked into asset quality, in particular with regard to the European and US experience, to the best of the authors’ knowledge there is no such study that explores cross-country Asian countries. In addition, the other primary determinants of Asian banks’ profitability are investigated. Further, the authors also looked in depth at the performance of the banks in advanced and non-advanced Asian economies.

中文翻译：

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银行盈利能力的决定因素：不良资产质量在亚洲的作用

目的本文的目的是研究亚洲银行盈利能力的决定因素，尤其关注资产质量的作用。由于《巴塞尔协议三》对银行监管施加了更为严格的要求，因此这一关注尤为重要。设计/方法/方法本文使用固定效应估计来对样本面板数据进行评估，该样本数据由2001年至2015年期间来自12个亚洲经济体的947家银行组成。结论作者发现，不良的资产质量（按减值的贷款比总贷款衡量）对银行的盈利能力有重大的负面影响。其他银行特定的变量-资本充足率，收入多元化和经营效率低下-也是重要的决定因素。关于宏观经济因素，实际国内生产总值增长对银行的业绩影响最大。研究的局限性/意义作者还发现，在非先进经济体中经营的银行比在发达经济体中经营的银行享有更高的利润率。实际意义尽管多年来亚洲银行的平均资产质量有所改善，但各国政府仍可促进更多的竞争，特别是在非先进经济体中。建议该地区的银行通过避免过度依赖利息收入来分散收入。原创性/价值尽管以前有一些研究研究过资产质量，特别是关于欧洲和美国的经验，但据作者所知，还没有这样的研究来探讨跨国亚洲国家。此外，研究了亚洲银行盈利能力的其他主要决定因素。此外，作者还深入研究了发达和非发达亚洲经济体中银行的业绩。