The Top 100 Arab banks were relatively isolated from the excesses of the global financial crisis, but 2008 results were not unaffected by the downturn that began with the Lehman collapse more than a year ago. While only a handful of banks, led by Bahrain's Arab Banking Corporation and Gulf International Bank, actually suffered losses in 2008 as a result of their international exposures, 21 banks across the region saw profits decline compared to 15 the previous year.
Although banks could not remain immune from the impact of the global credit crisis this year, they have continued to expand, unlike most banking sectors around the world. The aggregate Tier 1 capital for the Top 100 Arabs in the 2009 listing grew by 11.3% compared with the previous year, to reach $138.2bn. This is well down on the 2008 listing growth of 19.7%, but still ahead of the average 9.7% growth shown in the Top 1000 World Banks listing in July. Although Arab banks are expanding, they are still relatively small on the global stage, with the Top 100 aggregate Tier 1 capital only amounting to 3.2% of the Top 1000 aggregate capital of $4276bn.
