Bank Efficiency, Risk-Based Capital, and Real Estate Exposure: The Credit Crunch Revisited

The turbulent real estate market during the early 1990's coincided with the implementation of risk-based capital standards for commercial banks. In this study we use nonparametric linear programming techniques to identify the lost real estate lending due to bank inefficiency. Inefficiency may arise from one of three sources: risk-based capital standards which constrain bank real estate lending, inefficiency stemming from managerial oversight of real estate lending, and scale inefficiency which arises from banks not operating at constant returns to scale. The results indicate that the lost real estate lending associated with risk-based capital standards averaged 2.7% of total bank assets. However, banks could compensate by exercising better managerial oversight of real estate lending and by operating at constant returns to scale.