Abstract: In the context of deep population aging, commercial banks face distinctly different population aging pressures due to variations in their operational characteristics and branch layouts. However, existing studies mostly adopt regional aging data to analyze its impact on bank risks, making it difficult to accurately reflect the heterogeneity in risk exposures across individual banks. This paper, based on the operational characteristics and branch distributions of commercial banks, categorizes and calculates the aging pressure index faced by 201 banks from 2010 to 2023, and examines its specific impact on bank risk-taking. The findings are as follows: (1) Population aging significantly exacerbates bank risk-taking, and this conclusion remains robust after a series of robustness tests; (2) Heterogeneity analysis reveals that the impact of population aging is most significant on city commercial banks, and banks headquartered in cities with net population inflows have higher risk exposures; (3) Active fiscal policy plays a positive moderating role in mitigating the impact of population aging on risk-taking in the banking sector, with fiscal expenditure and fiscal deficit dimensions being particularly prominent in enhancing banks' risk resilience.

Key words: population aging, bank risk-taking, active fiscal policy, moderating effect