For the first time in the history of the Top 1000 banks listing, The Banker magazine is providing a ranking of the top 25 banks found in the vibrant BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) economies in order to see how these growing giants fare when measured in terms of their banking system Tier 1 capital.
First, however, what do the buoyant BRIC countries look like in terms of economic performance? Not surprisingly, China is by far the largest economy of the four, with an output of $4909bn for 2009, according to the International Monetary Fund. Next is Brazil at $1574bn, with India third at $1236bn and then Russia at $1229bn. When ranked by projected gross domestic product (GDP) growth for 2010, however, Brazil and India swap places, with China again in the lead with 10% growth for 2010 and India not too far behind with 8.8% growth. Brazil and Russia, meanwhile, trail further behind at 5.5% and 4.25%, respectively.
