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This paper aims to evaluate the association between carbohydrate quality index (CQI) and nutrient adequacy in Iranian adults.

A total of 268 men and women with ages ranged from 18 to 70 years were evaluated in a cross-sectional study. The CQI was calculated by adding together the three components, namely, the ratio of solid to total carbohydrate, dietary fiber and glycemic index. The scores of three components were summed to calculate the CQI, with a higher score indicating a higher dietary carbohydrate quality. The odds ratios (ORs) of nutrient adequacy ratio (NAR), defined as the ratio of intake of a nutrient to the age- and gender-specific recommended dietary allowance, for the intake of energy and 10 nutrients across quartiles of the CQI were calculated by logistic regression analysis and expressed with 95% confidence intervals (CIs).

CQI ranged between 3 to 15 (mean ± SD: 9 ± 1.9). Being in top versus bottom quartile of the CQI was associated with a higher NAR of folic acid (OR: 3.20, 95% CI: 1.06–9.62; P-trend: <0.001), vitamin A (OR: 3.66; 95% CI: 1.46–9.17; P-trend: <0.001), magnesium (OR: 5.94; 95% CI; 1.71–20.53; P-trend: <0.001), vitamin C (OR: 7.85; 95% CI; 2.99–20.59; P-trend: <0.001).

A higher CQI was associated with greater micronutrient consumption adequacy in Iranian adults. The results suggest that increasing the consumption of total fiber and solid carbohydrates and decreasing the glycemic index of the diet and liquid carbohydrates can improve micronutrient intake adequacy.

This study aims to investigate how ownership structure and bank regulations individually and interactively influence risk-taking behaviour of a bank.

This empirical framework is based on dynamic two-step system generalised method of moments estimation technique to analyse an unbalanced panel data set covering 144 conventional banks from 12 Middle East and North Africa (MENA) countries.

The estimation results suggest that foreign shareholding has an inverse relationship with bank risk-taking. In addition, official supervisory power is found to have a positive association with bank risk, and this relationship is reinforced for banks with higher ownership concentration. In addition, capital stringency increases bank risk, whereas market discipline has an opposite effect, only in countries with higher activity restrictions. Finally, the interaction between ownership concentration and activity restriction has an inverse association with bank risk-taking.

Overall, the evidence suggests that the Basel II framework and the regulatory reform initiatives in the post-global financial crisis period do not seem to have reduced bank risk-taking in MENA countries.

This study contributes to the literature on the effectiveness of regulatory reform based on the three pillars of the Basel II guidance (capital regulations, market-oriented disclosures and official supervisory power), and offers evidence in support of “political/regulatory capture hypothesis” of bank regulation. The results also provide support for “global advantage hypothesis” of bank ownership.

This paper aims to investigate the impact of capital requirements and bank competition on banks' risk-taking behavior in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.

The study combines both descriptive and analytical approaches. It considers panel data sets and adopts panel data econometric techniques like fixed effects/random effects and generalized method of moments estimator.

Regulatory capital and market competition have different effects according to the bank’s type (Islamic or conventional). The results show that the capital adequacy ratio has a significant impact on the credit risk of conventional banks (CBs) while this effect is irrelevant for Islamic banks (IBs). However, market competition plays a significant role in shaping risk-taking behavior of Islamic banking institutions. Our results indicate that banks with strong market power may pursue risky strategies in the face of increased regulatory pressure (e.g. increased minimum capital requirements). The results were robust to alternative profitability measures and endogeneity checks.

The most important limitation is the lack of data for some banks and years, and this paper had to exclude some variables because of missing observations. The second limitation concerns the number of IBs in the sample. However, this can be overcome by including more countries from MENA and other regions where Islamic banking is a growing phenomenon.

Our findings call for a change in Islamic banking’s traditional business model based on the prohibition of interest. The analysis indicates that market concentration moderates the association between capital requirements and the insolvency risk of IBs but not CBs. Therefore, regulatory authorities concerned with improving financial stability in the MENA region should set up their policies differently depending on the level of banking market concentration. Finally, bank managers are requested to apply a more disciplined approach to their lending decisions and build sufficient capital conservation buffers to limit the impact of downside risk from the depletion of capital buffers during the pandemic.

This study addresses banks’ risk-taking behavior and stability in the MENA region, which includes banks of different types (Islamic and conventional). This paper also contributes to the literature on bank stability by identifying the most critical factors that affect bank risk and stability in the MENA region, which can be relevant in the context of the new global (COVID-19) crisis.

This study examines the effect of political connections on the performance of banks in the MENA region separately and then moderated by family, institutional and state ownership.

A hierarchical regression method was used for a sample of 111 banks operating in 10 MENA countries observed from 2009 to 2019.

The results indicate significant negative relationships between political connections and bank performance. Furthermore, institutional and family ownership moderates this relationship; institutional investors and family shareholders attenuate separately the negative impact of political connections on bank performance. Moreover, state ownership positively moderates this relationship; states as shareholders accentuate the negative relationship between political connections and bank performance. Splitting our sample according to bank-specific features (banks in authoritarian regimes versus hybrid regimes, Islamic banks versus conventional banks) confirms our findings. Our results are robust to an alternative measure of bank performance.

Banks operating in the MENA region have to be aware of the consequence of political connections. In addition, they have to take into account the role of ownership structure when they seek to attenuate the harmful effect of political connections.

This paper offers an in-depth understanding of the impact of political connections on bank performance by drawing from two institutional logics: resource dependence logic and agency logic. Some recommendations on the importance of changing the existing ownership structure are highlighted, encouraging some investors to take part in the capital of banks in this region.

The role of foreign banks in impacting the behavior of domestic banks has been a relatively unaddressed topic in the literature. Employing bank-wise data on MENA countries during 2000-2012, the purpose of this paper is to examine how the behavior of foreign banks impact domestic bank performance. For this purpose, the authors focus on not only their profitability and stability, but also on broader numbers such as loan portfolio and funding costs. In addition, the authors also explore the impact of foreign banks on the growth of domestic economies and its implications for the allocation of capital and labor.

The authors employ the dynamic panel data methodology as compared to alternate techniques owing to the ability of this technique to effectively address the endogeneity problem of some of the independent variables.

The results suggest that foreign bank presence exerts significant spillover effects. At the same time, increased foreign banks appear to impel domestic banks to cut back lending. As regards its impact on growth, the results indicate that although labor does not exert any discernible impact on GDP growth, capital exerts a positive impact on output when foreign bank penetration is high, supportive of the real effects of foreign banks.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is one of the early studies for MENA countries to examine this issue in a systematic manner. Most studies of this genre focus on a limited set of banks/countries, thereby limiting their empirical evidence. By focussing on an extended sample of MENA country banks covering an extended period that subsumes the financial crisis, the analysis is also able to shed light as to how foreign presence impacts domestic bank performance.

This paper aims to investigate the impact of regulation and market competition on the risk-taking Behaviour of financial institutions in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.

The empirical framework is based on panel fixed effects/random effects specification. For robustness purpose, this study also uses the generalized method of moments estimation technique. This study tests the hypothesis that regulatory capital requirements have a significant effect on financial stability of Islamic and conventional banks (CBs) in the MENA region. This study also investigates the moderating effect of market power and concentration on the relationship between capital regulation and bank risk.

The estimation results support the view that capital adequacy ratio (CAR) has no significant impact on credit risk of Islamic banks (IBs), whereas market competition does play a significant role in shaping the risk behavior of these institutions. This study report opposite results for CBs – an increase in the minimum capital requirements is followed by an increase in a bank’s risk level, which has a negative impact on their financial stability. Furthermore, the results support the notion of a non-linear relationship between banking concentration and bank risk. The findings inform the regulatory authorities concerned with improving the financial stability of banking sector in the MENA region to set their policy differently depending on the level of concentration in the banking market.

This study contributes to the literature on the effectiveness of regulatory reforms (in this case, capital requirements) and market competition for bank performance and risk-taking. In regard to IBs, capital requirements are less effective in requiring IBs to adjust their risk level according to the Basel III methodology. This study finds that IBs’ risk behavior is strongly associated with market competition, and therefore, the interest rates. Moreover, banks operating in markets with high banking concentration (but not necessarily, low competition), will decrease their credit risk level in response to an increase in the minimum capital requirements. As a result, these banks will be more stable compared to their conventional peers. Thus, regulators and policymakers in the MENA region should restrict the risk-taking behavior of IBs through stringent capital requirements and more intense banking supervision.

The practical implications of these findings are that the regulatory authorities concerned with improving banking sector stability in the MENA region should proceed differently, depending on the level of banking market concentration. The findings inform regulators and policymakers to set capital requirements at levels that would restrict banks from taking more risk to increase their returns. They are also important for bank managers who should avoid risky strategies in response to increased regulatory pressure (e.g. increase in the minimum required capital level of 8%), as they may lead to an increase in the level of non-performing loans, and therefore, a greater probability of bank default. A future extension of this study will focus on testing the effect of bank risk-taking and market competition on the capitalization levels of banks in the MENA countries. More specifically, this study will investigates if banks raise their capitalization levels during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The analysis of previous research indicates that there is no unambiguous answer to the question of whether IBs perform differently than CBs under different competitive conditions. To fill this gap, this study examines the influence of capital regulation and market competition (both individually and interactively) on bank risk-taking behavior using a large sample of banking institutions in 18 MENA countries over 14 years (2005–2018). For the first time in this line of research, this study shows that the level of market power is positively associated with the level of a bank’ insolvency risk. In others words, IBs operating in highly competitive markets are more inclined to take a higher risk than their conventional peers. Regarding the IBs credit risk behavior, this study finds that market power has a limited impact on the relationship between CAR and risk level. This means that IBs are still applying in their operations the theoretical models based on the prohibition of interest.

Which of the banking stream is relatively more profitable in Middle Eastern and North Africa (MENA) region?

The empirical study covers a sample of 15 conventional and 15 Islamic banks for the period 2002-2009.The authors estimate models using the generalized method of moments in system, of Blundell and Bond (1998). They exploit an up-to-date econometric technique which takes into consideration the issue of endogeneity of regressors to evaluate the comparative profitability of Islamic and conventional banks in the MENA region.

Empirical analysis results show that the determinants’ significance varies between Islamic and conventional banks. Profitability seems to be quite persistent in the MENA region reflecting a higher degree of government intervention and may signal barriers to competition.

The main interest is to develop a comprehensive model that integrates macroeconomic, industry-specific and bank-specific determinants. The paper makes comparison of the performance between two different banking systems in the MENA region. The authors consider a variable crisis to gain additional insights into the impacts of the financial crisis on MENA banking sector.

The aim of this paper is to examine whether multiple large shareholders and their interactions affect bank profitability in the MENA region.

To achieve this goal, we used a sample of conventional banks in the MENA region observed during the period 2004–2015. We performed the System Generalized Method of Moment as the empirical approach.

Empirical results indicate that under the dispersion hypothesis, multiple large shareholders (MLS) tend to reduce bank profitability for both return on assets (ROA) and return on equity (ROE). However, under the alignment of interests’ hypothesis, coalition between the first and the second largest shareholder increases bank profitability only for ROA. We also find that an additional large shareholder, beyond the two largest, reduces bank return equity.

To the best of our knowledge, to date, there is no study that investigates the effect of MLS and the bank profitability in the MENA region. Indeed, this study shows the importance of considering ownership composition among large shareholders in banking studies.

This study aims to investigate how multiple large shareholders individually and interactively influence Middle East and North Africa (MENA) bank stability.

The empirical framework is based on a generalized dynamic two-step system and utilizes the method of moments estimation to analyze a panel dataset of 532 bank-year observations over the 2004–2017 period.

The estimation results show that large shareholders are crucial in explaining the differences in bank stability among MENA banks. Specifically, the first- and second-largest shareholders exacerbate bank instability. However, we found that the third-largest shareholder enhances bank stability. Additionally, the coalition between the two largest shareholders increases the moral hazard problem in MENA banks and significantly decreases stability. Meanwhile, the interaction between the three largest shareholders is associated with a control contestability problem, which impels better bank stability. The results support the dispersion effect of multiple large shareholders in MENA countries.

The role of large shareholders in corporate governance is widely recognized. However, very little is known about the role and the real impact that multiple large shareholders may have on the banking sector. To the best of the authors' knowledge, this work is the first to analyze the relationship between multiple large shareholders and bank stability in the MENA region.

The relevance of economic freedom in influencing bank risk taking has not been adequately addressed in the literature. In this connection, employing bank-level data for 2000-2012, the purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of economic freedom on risk taking by MENA banks.

Given the cross-sectional time-series nature of the data, the author employs panel data techniques to explore this issue. In addition, the author examines the robustness of the results using instrumental variable techniques.

The findings appear to suggest that economic freedom exerts a significant and non-negligible impact on bank risk taking. Among the sub-components of economic freedom, it is observed that higher levels of both business and monetary freedom increase variability of profits and, thereby, raise the risk appetite of banks. Risk taking by banks appears to be reliably lower after the crisis than in the period prior to it, although there was a substantial increase in bank risk taking during the crisis.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is one of the earliest studies to explore the interlinkage between economic freedom and bank risk taking for MENA banks.