This paper investigates the cost efficiency of the Vietnamese banking industry. To obtain an appropriate estimate of cost efficiency, monotonicity and concavity constraints are incorporated in the estimation of the cost frontier using the Bayesian approach. Overall, the level of cost efficiency of Vietnam's banking sector is relatively high, around 87 percent. The findings reveal minor and insignificant differences in the cost efficiency of different groups of banks classified by ownership. Furthermore, throughout the estimation period, the industry faced a slight decrease in cost efficiency. This could be explained by increases in the costs of managing diverse activities, the enlargement of branch networks and the upgrading of the banking technology platform.

The serial underperformer of the region, Myanmar's economy is largely without the institutions and qualities necessary to achieve genuine economic growth. This paper explores the fundamentals of Myanmar's economy, from a perspective that emphasizes policy and institutional failure as the principal determinants of the country's present circumstances. The paper explores Myanmar's economy in a multifaceted way, examining concerns over economic growth, public finances, monetary and financial policies, corruption, and international trade. Notwithstanding the change in the form of Myanmar's governing institutions following the elections of November 2010, the paper concludes pessimistically as to the likelihood of meaningful economic reform in the foreseeable future.

This article analyses the cost and profit efficiencies of Australian banks over the period 1997–2009, including the impact of the recent global financial crisis. Using a stochastic frontier analysis, we find that Australian banks were relatively both cost‐ and profit‐efficient before the crisis. The crisis subsequently had an adverse effect on the profit efficiency of Australian banks, but had no significant impact on their cost efficiency. We also find that the major banks were more profit‐efficient, but less cost‐efficient, than their regional competitors. The article further investigates the factors determining differences in efficiency between Australian banks.

No abstract

No abstract