The Impact of COVID 19 Spread on Banking Performance: Evidence from Middle East Countries

Abstract

This paper tries to investigate the effects COVID 19 spread on the banking performance of MENA countries. COVID 19 spared has been measured by New Cases, Cumulative Cases, New Deaths and Cumulative Deaths. In addition, banking performance has been measured according to CAMELS approach that considers Capital adequacy, Asset quality, Management, Earnings, Liquidity and Sensitivity to market risk. This has been conducted on Bahrain, Cyprus, Egypt, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and United Arab Emirates, using panel data analysis according to GMM technique, during the period from 2017 to 2022. Results indicate that each of Cumulative Cases, New Deaths and Cumulative Deaths may significantly affect banking performance of MENA countries.