OCBC still the world's strongest bank: Bloomberg Markets

It topped the annual list for the second straight year while its two Singapore rivals slid further down the Top 10.

Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp beat out BOC Hong Kong Holdings (2nd) and Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (3rd) for the top spot, based on Bloomberg Markets' five selected criteria, which include comparing Tier 1 capital with risk-weighted assets and nonperforming assets with total assets.

Two other Singaporean lenders landed in the top 10, with United Overseas Bank Ltd. placing 7th and DBS Group Holdings, 8th.

“Singapore’s economy has performed quite stably and quite well, and for the Singaporean banks, we have real economic activities to finance,” OCBC CEO Samuel Tsien said in a release, crediting the bank’s strength partly to its "disciplined" credit management practices and "robust" risk management capabilities.

Overall though, Canadian banks dominated the list, clinching four of the Top 10 spots. CIBC was No. 3, followed by Toronto-Dominion Bank (No. 4), National Bank of Canada (No. 5) and Royal Bank of Canada (No. 6), the country’s largest lender.

"Canadian banks invoke their strong capital levels, the country’s conservative lending culture and strict regulatory oversight under a single supervisor as reasons for their showing. The supervisor requires Canadian banks to hold a higher level of capital than do international standards," said Bloomberg Markets in its report.

How did the US and EU banks fare? Not as well as their Singaporean and Canadian counterparts:

"Only three U.S. banks -- JPMorgan Chase (No. 13), PNC Financial Services Group Inc. (No. 17) and BB&T Corp. (No. 20) -- made the top 20. Four European banks were included: two from Sweden and one each from the U.K. and Switzerland," said Bloomberg Markets.