A look at the methodology used to compile The Banker's Top 1000 World Banks ranking.
The Banker’s Top 1000 World Bank rankings for 2013 shows that Asia-Pacific is the most profitable region globally.
The need for a multilateral bail out of eurozone member Slovenia will depend on the state of its troubled banking sector, which lost a significant proportion of its capital in 2011.
Three Singaporean lenders occupy the top three spots in The Banker's Association of South-east Asian Nations banks ranking by Tier 1 capital for the year ending 2011, and the same three institutions also led the way in terms of pre-tax profits.
Taken as a single entity, Germany's savings bank sector is the second largest financial institution in the country. And, unlike the country's top 10 banks, it has been growing since 2008.
A number of foreign banks scaled back operations in Russia after the financial crisis, but those that remain are generating very high returns in many cases.
The Cypriot banking sector was more than four times the size of the country's economy at the end of 2011.
European banks have been under pressure to deleverage to comply with new capital regulations and absorb losses. But many have reduced the risk in their balance sheet, rather than shrinking total assets.
Western European banks have a market share of almost two-thirds of assets in eastern Europe (excluding Russia), but their dominance does not extend to every market.
Acquisitions by both private and state-owned banks in Russia are gradually concentrating the top end of the banking sector, but the long tail of closely held and regional banks remains.
Only Barclays has a significant market share in Africa by total assets, and most of that is accounted for by a single subsidiary. Other European banks still have an insignificant presence in one of the fastest-growing banking markets.
Banks specialising in consumer lending are earning impressive returns in Russia, but state and foreign-owned players still dominate the banking sector as a whole.
A series of mergers will change the shape of the Greek banking sector, with three dominant players pulling away from the pack.
Trading revenues at African banks outstrip the rest of the world as a proportion of total income, but North America remains the leader in fee and commission income.
Many banks in the eurozone cut their lending activity heavily in 2011, and many non-European banks also scaled back their exposure. But some countries with surplus liquidity are stepping into the breach.
Subsidiaries in emerging markets may provide western European banks with some respite from troubles at home, but emerging market parents appear to get better results on their travels.
It is understandable that the European Commission wants more women on company boards; western European banks are among the worst in the world for gender equality in the executive suite.
The decline of Japan’s banking sector in the 1990s may provide some indication of how European bank deleveraging will unfold over the next few years.
In the regulatory rush to strengthen Tier 1 capital, banks that seek to optimise their total capital structure have become an endangered species. But one region has rediscovered Tier 2 capital.
The Banker cannot predict which banks will turn out to be involved in the Libor scandal, but we can identify the banks where traders wield the most revenue-generating power.