The influence of loans agriculture on net profit of cooperative banks in Poland

The aim of the research was to determine whether and to what extent loans for agriculture, i.e. loans for farms and preferential loans affected the level of net profit of cooperative banks in Poland in 2015-2017. The research determined, e.g. that loans for farms are important for generating net profit for small, medium and large cooperative banks. However, the values of the regression coefficient for this variable were relatively low with a slight increasing tendency. The variable defining preferential loans for agriculture appeared only in two models out of nine constructed and with a negative sign. This concerned small and medium-sized cooperative banks. For large cooperative banks, preferential loans for agriculture were not of key importance in generating net profit. Therefore, it can be indicated that preferential loans do not bring financial benefits for cooperative banks. However, cooperative banks support these loans due to their mission towards their members and the environment, related to the development of agriculture as well as rural areas. Regardless of this, it will be necessary to reconstruct the financial revenues of servicing preferential loans.