Pre-registration
Vietnam's 2012-2015 banking-sector restructuring — Vietnam Asset Management Company (VAMC) created July 2013, NPL ratio peak above 4%, mandatory mergers of weak banks, and forced central-bank acquisition of three commercial banks at zero VND in 2015 — represents a controlled-resolution emerging-market banking distress event without a full systemic crisis. The hypothesis is that Vietnam 2012-2015 meets a deliberately- narrow multi-metric checklist on at least 3 of 4 metrics WITHOUT producing a Laeven-Valencia coded crisis or a real-GDP recession.
Falsification criterion — what would disprove this
This hypothesis is considered falsified if:
Evaluate every canonical_metrics row against its pre-registered source, window, and threshold. The hypothesis is SUPPORTED if at least 3 of 4 metrics are MET. It is REFUTED if even counting all pending metrics as favorable cannot reach 3 MET metrics and the confirmed failures cross the pre-registered refutation guardrail. Otherwise the verdict is INCONCLUSIVE until pending data or pending evaluation metrics are resolved.
formal test & threshold
test: multi_metric_checklist_canonical_banking_crisis threshold: MET >= 3 of 4; REFUTE when MET + PENDING_DATA + PENDING_EVAL < 3; refutation guardrail=1
Method
- Template
multi_metric_checklist- Clustering
none- Sample
- 1 countries · 2008 – 2018
- Evidence type
- canonical_case_multi_metric
Canonical-case checklist evaluator reads canonical_metrics and multi_metric_falsification; no regression model is estimated. Each metric is scored against its pre-registered source, window, and threshold before applying the count rule below.
Data
| Variable | Source | Transform |
|---|---|---|
bank_npl_ratio outcome | world_bank_wdi:FB.AST.NPER.ZStier 2 | peak_level |
real_gdp_growth outcome | world_bank_wdi:NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZGtier 2 | annual_yoy |
● ready · ● pending · ● reconstruct-needed
Detailed result card
Result card — banking_crisis_vietnam_2012_2015_restructuring
Verdict: supported
Reason: 3 of 4 metrics met threshold (support threshold 3)
Pre-registered rule: SUPPORT if >= 3 of 4 metrics met; REFUTE if <= 1 met (impossible to hit support).
Counts: 3 MET · 1 NOT_MET · 0 PENDING_DATA · 0 PENDING_EVAL
Primary country: VNM
Metric-by-metric
| # | Metric | Status | Observed | Threshold | Notes |
|---|---|:---:|---:|---|---|
| 1 | bank_npl_ratio_peak | NOT_MET | 3.5 (2014) [max_in_window_fallback] | >= 4% reported NPL ratio | |
| 2 | vamc_created_2013 | MET | 1 (2013) [yes_no_indicator_max] | yes/no — yes counts as breach | yes/no event evaluated from binary event indicator |
| 3 | zero_vnd_bank_acquisitions_2015 | MET | 3 (2015) [yes_no_indicator_max] | yes/no — yes counts as breach | yes/no event evaluated from binary event indicator |
| 4 | real_gdp_growth_undisturbed | MET | 5.5 (2015) [annual_growth_rate_value] | annual growth >= 5% in each year (negative-control: contained restructuring) | annual growth values: 2012=5.505, 2013=5.554, 2014=6.422, 2015=6.987; threshold each >=5 |
Claim
Vietnam's 2012-2015 banking-sector restructuring — Vietnam Asset Management Company (VAMC) created July 2013, NPL ratio peak above 4%, mandatory mergers of weak banks, and forced central-bank acquisition of three commercial banks at zero VND in 2015 — represents a controlled-resolution emerging-market banking distress event without a full systemic crisis. The hypothesis is that Vietnam 2012-2015 meets a deliberately- narrow multi-metric checklist on at least 3 of 4 metrics WITHOUT producing a Laeven-Valencia coded crisis or a real-GDP recession.
Interpretation
The canonical-case pattern match is satisfied: 3 of 4 pre-registered metrics meet their thresholds, above the support threshold of 3. Each metric is drawn from an independent data source and measures a different causal layer, so the probability of this pattern arising from a data-pipeline fault across all sources simultaneously is low.
Steelman live concerns
See hypotheses/steelman/banking_crisis_vietnam_2012_2015_restructuring.md for the strongest opposing arguments. Canonical-case multi-metric evidence is a pattern match, not a causal identification — the result card should be read as 'outcome trajectory matches the predicted pattern to degree X' rather than 'policy P caused the outcome'.
Provenance
Vintages pinned in manifest.yaml. Full per-metric diagnostics in diagnostics.json. Machine-readable results in metric_results.parquet.
Strongest opposing argument
Every hypothesis ships with its charitable opposing argument. The framework earns credibility by handling objections at their strongest, not weakest.