Data Envelopment Analysis on Measuring the Performance of Vietnamese Joint-Stock Commercial Banks

Commercial banks have a significant impact on the economy of Vietnam because they provide the majority of transactional capital. Therefore, the operational efficiency of commercial banks is a viral topic for the study of the Vietnamese banking system. The research aims to examine the efficiency and inefficiency of joint-stock commercial banks in Vietnam from 2016 to 2020 and then classify them into the efficient group and inefficient group. The study employs the time series data of 29 joint-stock commercial banks during the period 2016–2020. Based on the data collected from the annual audited financial statements of 29 Vietnamese joint-stock commercial banks, the authors select input and output variables for the standard DEA models and anti-efficient DEA models. This research uses two stages, first, by applying the standard DEA model, we investigate the efficient banks; second, by employing the anti-efficient DEA model, we find out the inefficient banks. The results reveal that the average efficiency score of 29 joint-stock commercial banks tends to increase in the period 2016–2018 and decrease gradually in the period 2019–2020. The findings of this study suggest that several small and medium-sized banks in the Vietnamese banking sector have both promising and risky performances and the efficiency of state-owned commercial banks has also improved significantly during the study period.