*CBN’s stress test shows gives negative signal
The Capital Adequacy Ratios (CARs) of three big banks have fallen below
regulatory capital requirement, the result of stress test conducted by
the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on the status of the banking system
has shown.
Overall, the result of the solvency stress test indicated the potential
for high contagion risk through unsecured interbank exposure
as three banks including two Systemically Important Banks failed CAR
after a 100 per cent default shock.
The test, contained in the Financial Stability Report, released
yesterday by the CBN governor, Godwin Emefiele, classified lenders into
three groups: large banks, those with assets greater than or equal to N1
trillion; medium banks with assets greater than or equal to N500
billion but less than N1 trillion and small banks with assets of less
than N500 billion.
The CAR is a ratio of bank’s assets to its risks and is 10 per cent for
national banks and 15 per cent for banks with international subsidiaries
and 16 per cent for Systematically Important Banks (SIBs). It said the
baseline CAR for the banking industry, large, medium, and small banks
stood at 14.78, 15.47, 12.75 and 3.14 per cent, respectively.
The banking industry stress test was carried out at end-December
last year, covering 23 commercial and merchant banks, and
evaluated the resilience of the banks to credit, liquidity,
interest rate and contagion risks.
The tests, which measured the lenders’ positions as at December last
year, were conducted using the Implied Cash Flow Analysis (ICFA)
and Maturity Mismatch/Rollover Risk methods, to assess the
resilience of individual banks and the banking industry to both
liquidity and funding shocks.
It revealed that after a one-day run, the liquidity ratio for the
industry would decline to 30.2 per cent from the 44.4 per cent pre
-shock position and, to 9.73 per cent and 6.76 per cent after a
five-day and cumulative 30-day run, respectively.
Similarly, a five-day and cumulative 30-day run on the banking
industry would result in liquidity shortfalls of N2.1 trillion and
N2.3 trillion, respectively.
The test showed that commercial banks experienced deterioration in
assets quality at end-December 2016. The ratio of non-performing loans
(NPLs) to gross loans deteriorated by 2.3 and 8.7 percentage points to
14 per cent compared with the levels at end-June 2016 and end-December
2015, respectively.
The deterioration in asset quality, the report said, was largely
attributed to the rising inflationary trend, negative Gross Domestic
Product (GDP) growth, and the depreciation of the naira.
The CBN said economic crisis adversely impacted borrowers, resulting in
rising NPLs which required additional provisioning by banks, thereby
reducing the banks’ CAR.
CBN, please make sure our money in the banks are safe.
CBN, please make sure our money in the banks are safe.
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