Liberalization Post-Crisis Restructuring and Internationalization in Turkish Banking

Abstract

This study provides a historical review of the transformation of the Turkish banking sector since the initiation of the financial liberalization program in 1980. It demonstrates the roles of macroeconomic institutional and firm-level factors in the evolution of market and ownership structures as well as the performance of the sector. It focuses on the penetration of foreign banks in the Turkish market and the more recently observed entries of Turkish banks into neighboring countries. It contributes to the literature by illustrating how the domestic macroeconomic and institutional environment together with international banking circumstances affect the processes and outcomes of internationalization in emerging banking markets.