Sources Of Non-Performing Loans In Turkish Banking System

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of the unlimited deposit insurance on non-performing loans and market discipline. Deposit insurance program play a crucial role in achieving financial stability. Governments in many advanced and developing economies established deposit insurance schemes for reducing the risk of systemic failure of banks. Deposit insurance has a beneficial effect of reducing the probability of a bank run. However deposit insurance systems have its own set of problems. Deposit insurance systems create moral hazard incentives that encourage banks to take excessive risk. Turkey established an explicit deposit insurance system in 1960. Until 1994, the coverage determined by a flat rate but in that date, Turkey experienced a major economic crisis. In April 1994, Turkish government started to apply an unlimited deposit insurance scheme to restore banking system stability. Unlimited deposit insurance caused a remarkable increase at non-performing loans. This paper empirically estimates the impact of unlimited deposit insurance system on non-performing bank loans (NPLs) and analyses the other potential sources of NPLs.