Risk, capital and efficiency in Chinese Banking

We assess the relationship between bank efficiency, risk and capital for a sample of Chinese commercial banks employing three efficiency indexes and four risk indicators under a three stage least square method in a panel data framework. The empirical evidence suggests that there is a positive and significant relationship between risk (loan-loss provision as a fraction to total loans or LLPTL) and efficiency in Chinese banking industry, while the relationship between risk (Z-score) and level of capitalization is negative and significant.