Volume 12, Issue 9 (September 2025), Pages: 252-265
----------------------------------------------
Original Research Paper
The impact of non-traditional activities on the technical efficiency of commercial banks: Evidence from Vietnam
Author(s):
Doan Trang Do 1, Anh Hoang Le 2, *
Affiliation(s):
1Faculty of Economics, Binh Duong University, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam 2Faculty of Banking, Ho Chi Minh University of Banking, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Full text
Full Text - PDF
* Corresponding Author.
Corresponding author's ORCID profile: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9670-2060
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.21833/ijaas.2025.09.025
Abstract
This study investigates the effect of non-traditional activities on the operational efficiency of Vietnamese commercial banks during the period 2016–2024. The data envelopment analysis (DEA) method is used to measure bank efficiency, while fixed effects, random effects, and system generalized method of moments (GMM) models are applied for estimation. The results indicate that non-traditional activities (NTAs) improve bank efficiency. In addition, the lagged value of bank efficiency and the ratio of loans to total assets have a positive influence on efficiency. In contrast, bank size and inflation reduce efficiency. The study does not find evidence of a relationship between return on assets, capital adequacy ratio, and economic growth rate with bank efficiency. These results provide useful insights for commercial banks in developing new non-traditional products and services to enhance operational efficiency.
© 2025 The Authors. Published by IASE.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Keywords
Bank efficiency, Non-traditional activities, Data envelopment analysis, Vietnamese banks, System GMM
Article history
Received 27 April 2025, Received in revised form 6 August 2025, Accepted 28 August 2025
Funding
The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial and institutional support provided by the Ho Chi Minh University of Banking. This support facilitated access to research resources, data, and academic infrastructure, which significantly contributed to the successful completion of this study. The funding body had no role in the design of the study, data collection, analysis, interpretation of results, or writing of the manuscript.
Acknowledgment
No Acknowledgment.
Compliance with ethical standards
Conflict of interest: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Citation:
Do DT and Le AH (2025). The impact of non-traditional activities on the technical efficiency of commercial banks: Evidence from Vietnam. International Journal of Advanced and Applied Sciences, 12(9): 252-265
Permanent Link to this page
Figures
Fig. 1 Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Tables
Table 1 Table 2 Table 3 Table 4 Table 5
----------------------------------------------
References (47)
- Adesina KS (2019). Basel III liquidity rules: The implications for bank lending growth in Africa. Economic Systems, 43(2): 100688. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecosys.2018.10.002
[Google Scholar]
- Ahamed MM (2017). Asset quality, non-interest income, and bank profitability: Evidence from Indian banks. Economic Modelling, 63: 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.econmod.2017.01.016
[Google Scholar]
- Akhigbe A and Stevenson BA (2010). Profit efficiency in U.S. BHCs: Effects of increasing non-traditional revenue sources. The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, 50(2): 132–140. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.qref.2009.11.003
[Google Scholar]
- Allen F and Santomero AM (1997). The theory of financial intermediation. Journal of Banking & Finance, 21(11-12): 1461–1485. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0378-4266(97)00032-0
[Google Scholar]
- Almumani MA (2013). Impact of managerial factors on commercial bank profitability: Empirical evidence from Jordan. International Journal of Academic Research in Accounting, Finance and Management Sciences, 3(3): 298–310. https://doi.org/10.6007/IJARAFMS/v3-i3/203
[Google Scholar]
- Ariff M and Can L (2008). Cost and profit efficiency of Chinese banks: A non-parametric analysis. China Economic Review, 19(2): 260–273. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chieco.2007.04.001
[Google Scholar]
- Barth JR, Lin C, Ma Y, Seade J, and Song FM (2013). Do bank regulation, supervision and monitoring enhance or impede bank efficiency? Journal of Banking & Finance, 37(8): 2879–2892. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbankfin.2013.04.030
[Google Scholar]
- Berger AN (2003). The economic effects of technological progress: Evidence from the banking industry. Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, 35(2): 141–176. https://doi.org/10.1353/mcb.2003.0009
[Google Scholar]
- Berger AN, Hasan I, and Zhou M (2010). The effects of focus versus diversification on bank performance: Evidence from Chinese banks. Journal of Banking & Finance, 34(7): 1417–1435. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbankfin.2010.01.010
[Google Scholar]
- Bian WL, Wang XN, and Sun QX (2015). Non-interest income, profit, and risk efficiencies: Evidence from commercial banks in China. Asia-Pacific Journal of Financial Studies, 44: 762–782. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajfs.12112
[Google Scholar]
- Casu B and Molyneux P (2003). A comparative study of efficiency in European banking. Applied Economics, 35(17): 1865–1876. https://doi.org/10.1080/0003684032000158109
[Google Scholar]
- Chortareas GE, Girardone C, and Ventouri A (2013). Financial freedom and bank efficiency: Evidence from the European Union. Journal of Banking & Finance, 37(4): 1223–1231. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbankfin.2012.11.015
[Google Scholar]
- Das A and Ghosh S (2006). Financial deregulation and efficiency: An empirical analysis of Indian banks during the post reform period. Review of Financial Economics, 15(3): 193–221. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rfe.2005.06.002
[Google Scholar]
- DeYoung R and Rice T (2004). Non-interest income and financial performance at U.S. commercial banks. The Financial Review, 39: 101–127. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0732-8516.2004.00069.x
[Google Scholar]
- Do TD, Pham HAT, Thalassinos EI, and Le HA (2022). The impact of digital transformation on performance: Evidence from Vietnamese commercial banks. Journal of Risk and Financial Management, 15(1): 21. https://doi.org/10.3390/jrfm15010021
[Google Scholar]
- Elsas R, Hackethal A, and Holzhäuser M (2010). The anatomy of bank diversification. Journal of Banking & Finance, 34(6): 1274–1287. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbankfin.2009.11.024
[Google Scholar]
- Fries S and Taci A (2005). Cost efficiency of banks in transition: Evidence from 289 banks in 15 post-communist countries. Journal of Banking & Finance, 29(1): 55–81. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbankfin.2004.06.016
[Google Scholar]
- Garrab MY and Yahyaoui A (2025). Impact of high and low-level capabilities on bank performance. International Journal of Advanced and Applied Sciences, 12(2): 91–100. https://doi.org/10.21833/ijaas.2025.02.010
[Google Scholar]
- Glass JC, McKillop DG, Quinn B, and Wilson J (2014). Cooperative bank efficiency in Japan: A parametric distance function analysis. The European Journal of Finance, 20(3): 291–317. https://doi.org/10.1080/1351847X.2012.698993
[Google Scholar]
- Gueyié JP, Guidara A, and Lai VS (2019). Banks’ non-traditional activities under regulatory changes: Impact on risk, performance and capital adequacy. Applied Economics, 51(29): 3184–3197. https://doi.org/10.1080/00036846.2019.1569197
[Google Scholar]
- Gulati R and Kumar S (2011). Impact of non-traditional activities on the efficiency of Indian banks: An empirical investigation. Macroeconomics and Finance in Emerging Market Economies, 4(1): 125–166. https://doi.org/10.1080/17520843.2010.530939
[Google Scholar]
- Gurley JG and Shaw ES (1955). Financial aspects of economic development. The American Economic Review, 45(4): 515–538.
[Google Scholar]
- Hermes N and Nhung VTH (2010). The impact of financial liberalization on bank efficiency: Evidence from Latin America and Asia. Applied Economics, 42(26): 3351–3365. https://doi.org/10.1080/00036840802112448
[Google Scholar]
- Hung NT, Thach NN, and Anh LH (2018). GARCH models in forecasting the volatility of the world’s oil prices. In: Anh LH, Dong LS, Kreinovich V, and Thach NN (Eds.), Econometrics for financial applications. ECONVN 2018. Studies in Computational Intelligence, 760: 673–683. Springer, Cham, Switzerland. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-73150-6_53
[Google Scholar]
- Jiang C, Yao S, and Zhang Z (2009). The effects of governance changes on bank efficiency in China: A stochastic distance function approach. China Economic Review, 20(4): 717–731. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chieco.2009.05.005
[Google Scholar]
- Kumbhakar SC and Wang D (2007). Economic reforms, efficiency and productivity in Chinese banking. Journal of Regulatory Economics, 32: 105–129. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11149-007-9028-x
[Google Scholar]
- Le TD (2018). Bank risk, capitalisation and technical efficiency in the Vietnamese banking system. Australasian Accounting, Business and Finance Journal, 12(3): 41–61. https://doi.org/10.14453/aabfj.v12i3.4
[Google Scholar]
- Lozano-Vivas A and Pasiouras F (2010). The impact of non-traditional activities on the estimation of bank efficiency: International evidence. Journal of Banking & Finance, 34(7): 1436–1449. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbankfin.2010.01.006
[Google Scholar]
- Maudos J and de Guevara JF (2004). Factors explaining the interest margin in the banking sectors of the European Union. Journal of Banking & Finance, 28(9): 2259–2281. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbankfin.2003.09.004
[Google Scholar]
- Mertens A and Urga G (2001). Efficiency, scale and scope economies in the Ukrainian banking sector in 1998. Emerging Markets Review, 2(3): 292–308. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1566-0141(01)00022-X
[Google Scholar]
- Minh NK, Long GT, and Hung NV (2013). Efficiency and super-efficiency of commercial banks in Vietnam: Performances and determinants. Asia-Pacific Journal of Operational Research, 30(1): 1250047. https://doi.org/10.1142/S0217595912500479
[Google Scholar]
- Ngo TV and Tripe D (2017). Measuring efficiency of Vietnamese banks: Accounting for nonperforming loans in a single-step stochastic cost frontier analysis. Pacific Accounting Review, 29(2): 171–182. https://doi.org/10.1108/PAR-06-2016-0064
[Google Scholar]
- Nguyen PA and Simioni M (2015). Productivity and efficiency of Vietnamese banking system: New evidence using Färe-Primont index analysis. Applied Economics, 47(41): 4395–4407. https://doi.org/10.1080/00036846.2015.1030565
[Google Scholar]
- Nguyen TL, Le AH, and Tran DM (2018). Bank competition and financial stability: Empirical evidence in Vietnam. In: Anh LH, Dong LS, Kreinovich V, and Thach NN (Eds.), Econometrics for financial applications. ECONVN 2018. Studies in Computational Intelligence, 760: 584–596. Springer, Cham, Switzerland. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-73150-6_46
[Google Scholar]
- Nguyen TPT and Nghiem SH (2020). The effects of competition on efficiency: The Vietnamese banking industry experience. The Singapore Economic Review, 65(6): 1507–1536. https://doi.org/10.1142/S0217590817500114
[Google Scholar]
- Noura AA, Lotfi FH, Jahanshahloo GR, Rashidi SF, and Parker BR (2010). A new method for measuring congestion in data envelopment analysis. Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, 44(4): 240-246. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.seps.2010.06.003
[Google Scholar]
- Olson D and Zoubi TA (2011). Efficiency and bank profitability in MENA countries. Emerging Markets Review, 12(2): 94–110. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ememar.2011.02.003
[Google Scholar]
- Panzar JC and Willig RD (1977). Economies of scale in multi-output production. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 91(3): 481–493. https://doi.org/10.2307/1885979
[Google Scholar]
- Pasiouras F (2008). Estimating the technical and scale efficiency of Greek commercial banks: The impact of credit risk, off-balance sheet activities, and international operations. Research in International Business and Finance, 22(3): 301–318. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ribaf.2007.09.002
[Google Scholar]
- Rogers KE and Sinkey JF Jr (1999). An analysis of nontraditional activities at U.S. commercial banks. Review of Financial Economics, 8(1): 25–39. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1058-3300(99)00005-1
[Google Scholar]
- Stewart C, Matousek R, and Nguyen TN (2016). Efficiency in the Vietnamese banking system: A DEA double bootstrap approach. Research in International Business and Finance, 36: 96–111. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ribaf.2015.09.006
[Google Scholar]
- Stiroh KJ (2004). Diversification in banking: Is noninterest income the answer? Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, 36(5): 853–882. https://doi.org/10.1353/mcb.2004.0076
[Google Scholar]
- Sufian F (2009). Determinants of bank efficiency during unstable macroeconomic environment: Empirical evidence from Malaysia. Research in International Business and Finance, 23(1): 54–77. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ribaf.2008.07.002
[Google Scholar]
- Thoraneenitiyan N and Avkiran NK (2009). Measuring the impact of restructuring and country-specific factors on the efficiency of post-crisis East Asian banking systems: Integrating DEA with SFA. Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, 43(4): 240–252. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.seps.2008.12.002
[Google Scholar]
- Tortosa-Ausina E (2003). Nontraditional activities and bank efficiency revisited: A distributional analysis for Spanish financial institutions. Journal of Economics and Business, 55(4): 371–395. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0148-6195(03)00026-2
[Google Scholar]
- Vu HT and Nahm D (2013). The determinants of profit efficiency of banks in Vietnam. Journal of the Asia Pacific Economy, 18(4): 615–631. https://doi.org/10.1080/13547860.2013.803847
[Google Scholar]
- Vu HT and Turnell S (2010). Cost efficiency of the banking sector in Vietnam: A Bayesian stochastic frontier approach with regularity constraints. Asian Economic Journal, 24(2): 115–139. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8381.2010.02035.x
[Google Scholar]
|