Basel accord capital regulations and financial risk management: Empirical evidence from Pakistan’s financial institutions

The Pakistani banking sector has shown tremendous growth in the last two decades and witnessed strategic reforms including the implementation of Basel regulations. The objective of this study is to investigate the effect of Basel capital regulations on the various proxies of the financial performance of the Pakistani commercial banks. This study uses three different proxies to assess the effectiveness of the Basel capital regulations on the financial performance of Pakistani commercial banks from 2006 to 2018 and quantifies the effect of different Basel accords on the banking sector of Pakistan using the dynamic panel data estimation technique. In addition, the effect of the Global Financial Crisis (2008) on the financial performance of Pakistani banks has also been evaluated. The results indicate that Basel II and Basel III capital regulations have affected the banks’ profitability differently. Capital regulations of Basel II have increased the performance while capital requirements of Basel III have not affected the financial performance of Pakistani banks, pointing towards the ineffectiveness of Basel III capital regulations. Besides, there has been no change observed in the financial performance of Pakistani banks during the Global Financial Crisis (2008). Overall, the results of the Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) technique show that Basel capital regulations enhance the financial performance of the Pakistani banking sector.