Bank regulation; a structural equation modelling of productivity change post 2008 crisis.

To examine the impact of the recent regulation post-2008 crisis and the progress in regulatory reforms, we utilise the fifth update of the World Bank - Bank Regulation and Supervision Survey (BRSS 2019) (Anginer<i> et al.</i>, 2019) which cover years 2011 to 2016. We complement this analysis by a comparative examination of the previous surveys covering the years 1999 to 2010. Such an extended panel on banks regulation and supervision, along with performance and productivity measures, is not a standard analysis in the literature, and it enables comparison and scenario-frontier analysis that strengthens evidence and outcome. The plausibility of our evidence is further established through implanting a Structural Equation Modelling (SEM and GSEM) method to analyse association and impact of regulation with/on banks productivity over the relative merits of stages and endogeneity. The implementation of SEM and GSEM contributes through several advantages for its competitiveness in handling complex and multi-layered models, and that enables the employment of a series of nested models and sequential chi-square difference tests. <br>