Introduction Many economies have adopted stiffer roles for their banking sector just within the last decade, following the recent financial crises, to improve upon the stability of their banks. This is because bank stability is very important to the growth of the country's economy; in the same vein bank runs or failures are costly to the whole economy (Ramadan et al., 2011; and Yan et al, 2012). The Ghanaian Banking Industry, like many African countries, have seen many reforms over the years all in a bid to making the banking sector more stable in order to strengthen its intermediation role and increase customers' confidence in the banking sector. In this direction was the introduction of the universal banking act in 2004 (started in 2003) which require banks to have a minimum capital of GH¢7,000,000. Banks had up to the end of 2006 to comply with the directive (Bawumia, 2006). This policy initiative was aimed at ensuring that banks would operate on a level playing field such as; accepting deposits and other repayable funds from the public; lending; investments in financial securities and money transmission services; the issuance and administration of means of payment (including credit cards, travellers' cheques and bank drafts); the issuance of guarantees and commitments trading for own account or for account of customers in money market instruments, foreign exchange or transferable securities; provision of advice on capital structure, acquisitions and mergers; portfolio management and advice; safe custody of valuables; electronic banking and any other services that the Bank of Ghana may determine (BankingAct, 2004). This is aimed at putting banks on the same competition and efficiency measurement scale in the banking industry. In 2009, however, the Bank of Ghana raised the minimum capital of banks from GH¢7,000,000 (done as a requirement for acquiring the universal banking licence implemented in 2003) to GH¢60 million while maintaining the capital adequacy ratio of the universal banking act still at 10% of total assets. Attaining capitalization requirements may be achieved through consolidation (mergers and acquisition) of existing banks, increasing the debt stock (increasing deposits), and raising funds through issuing of additional shares through existing shareholders or new shareholders or
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