Basel I and Basel II Norms: Some Empirical Evidence for the Banks in India

The recent financial sector crisis and the failure of banking system even in the developed countries like US have forced the policy makers and researchers to look into the details of such failures. Capital adequacy is an indicator of the financial health of the banking sector. It is measured by the Capital to Risk Weighted Asset Ratio (CRAR), defined as the ratio of a bank’s capital to its total risk-weighted assets. Financial regulations generally impose a capital adequacy norm on their banking and financial system in order to provide a buffer to absorb unforeseen losses due to risky investments. The CRAR is the most widely employed measure for the soundness of a bank. Globally, the CRAR ranges between 7.1% and 34.9%. The overall CRAR of the Indian scheduled commercial banks at the end of March, 2007 was 12.3%, as against the Indian regulatory requirement of 9%, which itself was higher than the Basel norm of 8%. This study presents the status of Capital Adequacy Ratio (CAR) of different categories of banks and also ascertains the impact of application of Basel II norms on CAR of selected banks.