This paper investigates the relationship between operating cost efficiency and the loan quality of Rus-sian banks. It tries to answer the question whether it is always beneficial for banks to be highly cost effi-cient (the “bad management” hypothesis) or whether this higher cost efficiency...

The article presents an empirical analysis of the interaction between market power of Russian banks and their resistance to credit risk during 2004Q1–2011Q2. We employ individual concentration index of banks in different asset markets (structural measure) and the Lerner index (unstructured...