Enhanced Prudential Standards Under Basel Iii: What Consequences for The Profitability of Banks

Since the subprime financial crisis, international financial regulatory institutions (Basel, MIFID, Dodd-Frank), have strengthened regulatory requirements on systemically important banks. The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, and based on the G20 recommendations, has drawn up a reform program to reconfigure the banking system, based mainly on increasing the capital requirement. The program has caused strong resistance from the banking industry leaders, saying that an excessive increase in regulatory capital will lead to an increase in the cost of financing of banks, which will have a negative impact on their profitability, and affect in fine the entire economic system. Due to the divergence of opinions regarding the impact of increasing capital requirements on the banking system, and the drastic lack of empirical literature on the Moroccan banking sector, we have decided to direct our research to fill this empirical deficiency. The main question we want to answer through our analytical approach, is how enhanced capital regulation would impact financial performance of the banking industry? Tio which extent this impact could be alleviated through risk management policies? To do so, and based on the empirical literature on this topic, we have conducted an analytical study, through Mathematical Modeling Analysis to compute the impact of the implementation of reinforced capital regulations on the profitability of banks. the goal of this article is to present the results of the impact analysis on the profitability of Moroccan banks using regression model applied to panel data, covering the 2010-2017 time period. The relevance of this study is derived from the several reforms applied to regulation of capital in the worldwide banking industry during the post-financial crisis period, including Morocco. In Morocco, Bank Al Maghrib, the regulator of banks, introduced reforms in the regulation of capital, through circular 14 / G / 2014 and circular 1 / W / 2016, modifying and strengthening the solvency ratios. This article presents the results of an impact study conducted based on the Panel's Multiple Data Regression Model and applied to 6 Moroccan banks during the post-financial crisis period, i.e., 2010-2017.