Hirigoyen hypothesis testing in listed commercial banks in Amman bourse

Abstract EN

This paper aims to empirically test the Hirigoyen hypothesis, which argues that a negative relationship between liquidity and profitability as financial literature indicates is just in a short term.

This relation will be positive in medium to long-term; it is argued that a firm with a low indicator of profitability or liquidity would have the other indicator deteriorated on the medium term.

The study sample includes thirteen banks representing all commercial banks listed in Amman Stock Exchange during the time period of 2006-2016.

Following previous studies, the two-dimensional analyses in addition to several statistical methods were used such as Person's correlation and simple regression analysis.

The results revealed the absence of the significant relationship between liquidity and profitability in short term.

The results also showed that Hirigoyen hypothesis seems to be inapplicable for commercial Jordanian banks, as 85 of the total sample movements (67%) are in oppose to Hirigoyen's hypothesis.

Finally, the study concludes that the profitability and liquidity trade-off is a highly challenging issue facing commercial banking in Jordan.