Systemic risk in ASEAN-6: a new empirical investigation

Purpose - The authors provide a comprehensive study on systemic risk of the banking sectors in the ASEAN-6 countries. In particular, they investigate the systemic risk dynamics and determinants of 49 listed banks in the region over the 2000–2018 period. Design/methodology/approach - The authors employ the market-based SRISK measure of Brownlees and Engle (2017) to investigate the systemic risk of the ASEAN-6's banking sectors. Findings - The authors find that the regional systemic risk fluctuates significantly and currently at par or higher level than that of the recent global financial crisis. Systemic risk is generally associated with banks that have bigger size, more traditional business models, lower quality in their loan portfolios, less profitable and with lower market-to-book values. However, these relationships vary significantly between ASEAN countries. Research limitations/implications - The research focuses on the systemic risk of ASEAN-6 countries. Therefore, the research results may lack generalizability to other countries. Practical implications - The authors’ empirical evidence advocates the use of capital surcharges on the systemically important financial institutions. Although the region has been pushing to higher financial integration in recent years, the authors encourage the regional regulators to account for the idiosyncratic characteristics of their banking sectors in designing effective macroprudential policy to contain systemic risk. Originality/value - This paper provides the first study on the systemic risk of the ASEAN-6 region. The empirical evidence on the drivers of systemic risk would be of interest to the regional regulators.