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This study explored the bank-specific and macroeconomic factors influencing capital adequacy in South African commercial banks. In this research, a balanced panel data set comprising 11 recapitalized banks was employed, spanning the period from 2008 to 2019. Employing panel regression techniques including OLS, Fixed Effects, Random Effects, and the Generalized Method of Moments (GMM), the analysis examines the influence of profitability (ROA), bank size, leverage, broad money supply, and the central bank’s monetary policy rate on the Capital Adequacy Ratio (CAR). The results indicate that profitability, bank size, leverage, and the broad money supply are critical determinants of capital sufficiency. Banks with increased profitability and increased exposure to the money supply typically demonstrate more robust capital positions. Larger bank size and increased leverage levels negatively affect capital adequacy ratios. The little impact of the delayed CAR signifies minimal persistence in capital buffer methods over time, implying that banks may not significantly depend on prior year capital conditions in their current capital planning. The study highlights the complex nature of capital sufficiency, influenced by microeconomic factors such as size and leverage, as well as macroeconomic indices like the money supply. The findings substantiate the Capital Buffer Theory and furnish critical insights for regulators, bank executives, and policymakers seeking to bolster the resilience of the banking industry in South Africa.

This study assesses the determinants of bank deposit flows under changing economic conditions by applying the dynamic panel two-step generalized methods of moments technique to annual observations covering 2007 to 2022 of 12 commercial banks in South Africa. The analysis revealed past deposit flow, profitability, bank size, and capital adequacy ratio as constituting a set of bank-specific variables with a positive predictive influence on deposit flows. At the same time, expenditure drives an adverse impact on deposits. These dynamics posit important implications for efficiency in bank expenditure management to sustain the inflow of depositors’ flows. Also, the results show the existence of a positive relationship between the unemployment rate and deposit flow, which is unexpected in practice, as an increase in joblessness in the country implies a decline in the financial capacity of the population to contribute to bank saving portfolios. However, the unexpected interaction between unemployment and deposit flow in this context can be explained by the adaptive principles of market interactions as the relationship between financial variables is unlikely to be the same under different economic conditions. Moreover, the analysis shows a positive effect of the economic condition on deposit flows which implies that an increase in national productivity exerts an impressive on the flow of depositors' funds to the banks based on market expansion and rapid growth momentum. Based on the findings, strategies to ensure the sustenance of a conducive macroeconomic environment should be reinforced by policymakers as the dynamics of bank deposit flows are linked to the direction of the current economic condition.

Stokvel is a term used in South Africa to denote an informal saving club. A large population of South Africa are members of one stokvel or the other. A large amount of stokvel savings go unaccounted for in the banking sector resulting in distortions in the flow of funds in the banking sector. Thus, the objective of this paper was to establish the presence of a long-run relationship and causality between stokvel savings, money supply, gross domestic product growth rate and banking sector liquidity in South Africa. Applying the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) and Error Correction Model (ECM) techniques on quarterly time series data for the period from 1987Q3 to 2020Q1, the study reveals that in the long run, stokvel savings and money supply were found to have a negative relationship with banking sector liquidity albeit insignificant, however, gross domestic product growth rate exhibited a negative and statistically significant relationship at 1%. The coefficient of the error correction model (ECM(-1)) was, as expected, negative and statistically significant thus providing evidence of a short-run relationship. This study concludes that informal savings must be included in the formal banking services to harness the cash that is held by the informal sector and thus improve banking sector liquidity while minimizing the prevalence of financial disintermediation.