reza aghababaie

According to the international financial statistics Iran’s banking system share in the international banking system is lower than 0.2 percent. This fact is a major obstacle in the way of financing economic activities in Iran. In addition, weak relations between Iranian and international banking systems have led to the divergence and imbalance between the domestic and international banking advances. Now, it looks necessary to find a solution for forging better interaction with international financial system. Global experiences manifest that establishing an offshore financial center (OFC) has proved to be a suitable choice. This article tries to assess such as a strategy as well as to analyze the functions of a successful OFC and its pre-requisites to achieve this goal

Banking system has a critical role in economic growth and development processes through two channels, investment financing and technological innovations. In this article through financial development indicators, it is examined that Iranian banking system does not completely perform such roles. Also, by applying institutional approach, The article explains how eliminating contractual interest rate following usury free transactions, leads to increase the banking transactions costs, and then shows that existing banking laws and regulation lacks required integrity and consistency for motivating specific forms of banking transactions (i.e. usury free transactions). In addition, the study reveals that, Iranian banking system suffers from weak governance structures, independent control system, and ruled by non-market adaptation mechanism. All these factors distort efficiency of Iranian banking system.