The Impact of Internet-Banking on Brick and Mortar Branches: The Case of Turkey

The increased adoption and infiltration of the Internet has recently redefined the playground for retail banks. Retail banks are now offering their services primarily through their Internet banking branches. The repercussions of this change to “brick and mortar” banks have been studied in the context of developed market economies. In this paper, we contribute to the literature by studying the impact of Internet banking adoption on banks’ deposit collection, lending activities, and performance in an emerging market setting. By using a panel of 18 retail banks that operate in Turkey from 1990–2008, we demonstrate that Internet banking adoption has a positive impact on the level of profits, deposits and loans per branch. As operational activities are now provided via Internet branches, Internet banking facilitates banking activities in branches that require more human input. We also find that Internet banking adoption has a negative impact on bank profitability after 2 years of adoption as Internet banking increases competition and results in lower interest income. Accordingly, Internet banking complements brick and mortar branches.     

Does deposit insurance improve financial intermediation? Evidence from the Russian experiment

This study examines how the introduction of deposit insurance affects depositors and banks, using the deposit-insurance scheme introduced into the Russian banking system as a natural experiment. The fundamental research question is whether the introduction of deposit insurance leads to a more effective banking system as evidenced by increased deposit-taking and decreased reliance upon State-owned banks as custodians of retail deposits. We find that banks entering the new deposit-insurance system increase both their level of retail deposits and their ratios of retail deposits to total assets relative to banks that do not enter the new deposit insurance system. These results hold up in a multivariate panel-data analysis that controls for bank- and time-random effects. The longer a bank has been entered into the deposit insurance system, the greater is its level of deposits and its ratio of deposits to assets. Moreover, this effect is stronger for regional banks and for smaller banks. We also find that implementation of the new deposit-insurance system has the effect of “leveling the playing field” between State-owned banks and privately owned banks. Finally, we find strong evidence of moral hazard following implementation of deposit insurance in the form of increased bank risk-taking. Financial risk and, to a lesser degree, operating risk increase following implementation.     

Internet Banking

We use multivariate logistic regressions to identify factors affecting adoption of Internet banking. These factors include membership in a bank holding company, an urban location, and relatively higher premises and other fixed expenses to net operating revenue, higher noninterest income, and greater accounting cost efficiency than non-Internet banks. More profitable banks were more likely to adopt Internet banking after Quarter 2 1998, but more profitable institutions were less likely to be among the first movers in adopting Internet banking. Among banks with assets over $100 million, institutions with transactional Internet banking were generally more profitable and tended to rely less heavily on traditional banking activities. For banks with less than $100 million in assets, there was no statistical difference in profitability among mature Internet and non-Internet banks, but de novo Internet banks were significantly less profitable than non-Internet de novos.An erratum to this article can be found at     

Banks’ capital buffer,risk and performance in the Canadian banking system: Impact of business cycles and regulatory changes

Using quarterly financial statements and stock market data from 1982 to 2010 for the six largest Canadian chartered banks, this paper documents positive co-movement between Canadian banks’ capital buffer and business cycles. The adoption of Basel Accords and the balance sheet leverage cap imposed by Canadian banking regulations did not change this cyclical behavior of Canadian bank capital. We find Canadian banks to be well-capitalized and that they hold a larger capital buffer in expansion than in recession, which may explain how they weathered the recent subprime financial crisis so well. This evidence that Canadian banks ride the business and regulatory periods underscores the appropriateness of a both micro- and a macro-prudential “through-the-cycle” approach to capital adequacy as advocated in the proposed Basel III framework to strengthen the resilience of the banking sector.     

Do Internet Activities Add Value? Evidence from the Traditional Banks

Very little is known about how adopting Internet activities impact traditional banks. By tracing the experience of Italian commercial banks, we provide evidence and implications for banks’ use of new Internet technology and innovative banking products as they relate to performance. Using different definitions for what is considered as Internet activity and by examining alternative proxies for bank return and risk, we find a significant link between offerings of Internet banking products and bank performance. Although this link is significantly positive for bank returns, we find a negative, marginally significant, association between the adoption of Internet activities and bank risk.

Bank ownership reform and bank performance in China

Using a panel of Chinese banks over the 1997–2004 period, we assess the effect of bank ownership on performance. Specifically, we conduct a joint analysis of the static, selection, and dynamic effects of (domestic) private, foreign and state ownership. We find that the “Big Four” state-owned commercial banks are less profitable, are less efficient, and have worse asset quality than other types of banks except the “policy” banks (static effect). Further, the banks undergoing a foreign acquisition or public listing record better pre-event performance (selection effect); however, we find little performance change in either the short or the long term.     

Is the Internet delivery channel changing banks’ performance? The case of Spanish banks

In spite of the conspicuous use of the Internet as a delivery channel, there is a relative dearth of empirical studies that provide a quantitative analysis of the impact of the Internet on banks’ financial performance. This paper attempts to fill this gap by identifying and estimating the impact of the adoption of a transactional web site on financial performance using a sample of 72 commercial banks operating in Spain over the period 1994–2002. The impact on banks’ performance of transactional web adoption takes time to appear. The adoption of the Internet as a delivery channel involves a gradual reduction in overhead expenses (particularly, staff, marketing and IT). This effect is statistically significant after one and a half years after adoption. The cost reduction translates into an improvement in banks’ profitability, which becomes significant after one and a half years in terms of ROA and after three years in terms of ROE. The paper also concludes that the Internet is being used as a complement to, rather than a substitute for, physical branches.     

Shareholder value efficiency in European banking

This paper advances the studies of [Hughes, J.P., Lang W.W., Mester L.J., Moon C.G., Pagano M.S., 2003. Do bankers sacrifice value to build empires? Managerial incentives, industry consolidation, and financial performance. Journal of Banking and Finance 27, 417–447] by developing a new measure of bank performance which we refer to as “shareholder value efficiency” – a bank producing the maximum possible Economic Value Added (EVA), given particular inputs and outputs, is defined as “shareholder value efficient”. This new efficiency measure is estimated using the stochastic frontier method focussing on the French, German, Italian and UK banking systems over the period 1997–2002 and includes both listed and non-listed banks. We find that European banks are, on average, 36% shareholder value inefficient. Shareholder value efficiency is found to be the most important factor explaining value creation in European banking, whereas cost and profit efficiency only have a marginal influence.     

互联网金融影响了商业银行流动性创造吗?

选取2010-2019年中国98家商业银行年度数据就互联网金融对银行流动性创造的影响及其作用机制进行实证分析.研究发现:互联网金融通过分流银行存款及理财资金对银行盈利形成冲击,由此引发的"鲶鱼效应"会倒逼银行加大存贷期限错配来缓解盈利下降压力,从而促进银行流动性创造.相对于国有银行与城农商行,互联网金融对股份制银行流动性创造的促进力度更大.金融脱媒仅在P2P网络借贷对银行流动性创造的影响中承担着中介作用,但"第三方支付-金融脱媒-银行流动性创造"的传导渠道无效.银行业景气度提高会加剧互联网金融对流动性创造的促进作用,银行流动性创造存在顺周期倾向.     

Deposit insurance and subsidized recapitalizations

The 2007–2009 financial crisis saw a vast expansion in deposit insurance guarantees around the world and yet our understanding of the design and consequences of deposit insurance schemes is in its infancy. We provide a new rationale for the provision of deposit insurance. In our model the banking sector exhibits both adverse selection and moral hazard, which implies that the social benefits of bank monitoring must for incentive reasons be shared between depositors and banks. Consequently, socially too few deposits are made in equilibrium. Deposit insurance – or, equivalently, bank recapitalization – corrects this market failure. We find that deposit insurance should be funded not by banks or depositors but out of general taxation. The optimal level of deposit insurance varies inversely with the quality of the banking system. Hence, when the soundness of the financial sector is uncertain, governments should consider supporting deposit insurance schemes and undertaking subsidized recapitalizations.     

The performance of banks around the receipt and repayment of TARP funds: Over-achievers versus under-achievers

In this paper, we look at how the pre-crisis health of banks is related to the probability of receiving and repaying TARP capital. We find that financial performance characteristics that are related to the probability of receiving TARP funds differ for the healthiest (“over-achiever”) versus the least healthy (“under-achiever”) banks. We find that TARP under-achievers have some, but not consistent, weaknesses in income production. These banks also are experiencing liquidity issues as customers, shut out of public debt markets, get bank loans through drawdowns of loan commitments. Unlike TARP under-achievers, TARP over-achievers’ loans are performing well. Yet, liquidity issues (from low levels of liquid assets and core deposits and drawdowns of loan commitments) hurt the abilities of these banks to continue their lending. Differences between under-achiever and over-achiever banks are also found for repayment and deadbeat TARP banks.     

The competitive implications of multimarket bank branching

Retail banking markets have traditionally been viewed as locally limited. However, recent studies have found evidence that large multimarket banking organizations tend to offer uniform interest rates for retail deposit accounts throughout the area that they serve, at least within a given state. This uniform pricing phenomenon raises questions about the continued relevance of the concept of local banking markets for both research and antitrust purposes.We address this issue by employing a model designed to explain the pricing behavior of single-market banks that face competition from multimarket banks. Empirical results are found to be consistent with the many implications of the model. We find that even with multimarket banks present in the market, local market concentration influences the pricing behavior of single-market banks; however, this relationship weakens as the market share of multimarket banks grows. We also find that, on average, multimarket banks offer lower deposit interest rates than do single-market banks operating in the same market, and, in most cases, greater multimarket bank presence is associated with lower deposit interest rates offered by single-market banks.     

The effects of reform on China’s bank structure and performance

This paper investigates the relationship between market structure and performance in China’s banking system from 1985 to 2002, a period when this sector was subject to gradual but notable reform. Using panel data estimation techniques, both the market-power and efficient-structure hypotheses are tested. In addition, the model is extended to consider issues such as the impact of bank size/ownership and whether the big four banks enjoy a “quiet life”. On average, X-efficiency declined significantly and most banks were operating below scale efficient levels. Estimation of the structure–performance models lends some support to the relative market-power hypothesis in the early period. The reforms had little impact on the structure of China’s banking sector, though the “joint stock” banks became relatively more X-efficient. There was no evidence to support the quiet-life hypothesis, probably because strict interest rate controls prevented the state banks from earning monopoly profits. Thus the ongoing liberalisation of interest rates should be accompanied by reduced concentration. Overall, to improve competitive structure, new policies should be directed at encouraging market entry and increasing the market share of the most efficient banks.     

What explains the low profitability of Chinese banks?

This paper analyzes empirically what explains the low profitability of Chinese banks for the period 1997–2004. We find that better capitalized banks tend to be more profitable. The same is true for banks with a relatively larger share of deposits and for more X-efficient banks. In addition, a less concentrated banking system increases bank profitability, which basically reflects that the four state-owned commercial banks – China’s largest banks – have been the main drag for system’s profitability. We find the same negative influence for China’s development banks (so-called Policy Banks), which are fully state-owned. Instead, more market-oriented banks, such as joint-stock commercial banks, tend to be more profitable, which again points to the influence of government intervention in explaining bank performance in China. These findings should not come as a surprise for a banking system which has long been functioning as a mechanism for transferring huge savings to meet public policy goals.     

Internet finance development and banking market discipline: Evidence from China

Depositor discipline is the only viable and universal source of banking market discipline in China. This paper investigates whether the depositor discipline of banking works in the context of an emerging economy under financial repression and implicit government guarantee, such as the Chinese economy; how banking market discipline is affected by Internet finance development; and whether the impact of Internet finance development on market discipline changes across heterogeneous banks. The results suggest that, in general, measures of bank risk are negatively associated with the growth of deposit volumes. Internet finance development alters the sensitivity of deposit growth ratios to some bank risk measures. For non-state-owned banks, fewer measures of bank risk are significantly negatively associated with the growth of deposit volumes, and the attenuation impact of Internet finance development on market discipline for bank capitalization instead relatively increases. For large banks, market discipline works significantly, except in the case of the bank capitalization variable; moreover, these significant market disciplines are strengthened with the development of Internet finance.     

Bank ownership and efficiency in China: What will happen in the world’s largest nation?

China is reforming its banking system, partially privatizing and taking on minority foreign ownership of three of its dominant “Big Four” state-owned banks. This paper helps predict the effects by analyzing the efficiency of Chinese banks over 1994–2003. Findings suggest that Big Four banks are by far the least efficient; foreign banks are most efficient; and minority foreign ownership is associated with significantly improved efficiency. We present corroborating robustness checks and offer several credible mechanisms through which minority foreign owners may increase Chinese bank efficiency. These findings suggest that minority foreign ownership of the Big Four will likely improve performance significantly.     

Do cross-country differences in bank efficiency support a policy of “national champions”?

As banking consolidation proceeds and Europe moves toward a single market, cross-country differences in banking efficiency can affect the future competitive position of a country’s financial market, helping to determine which European money centers may expand or contract. Looking at large banks across 10 countries, we find they are roughly equally efficient after controlling for differences in business environment, banking costs, and bank productivity. As no country seems to have a strong efficiency advantage, it seems likely that state efforts to promote “national champions” through favorable mergers which expand scale and market share may determine the outcome.     

Do Depositors Punish Banks for Bad Behavior? Market Discipline,Deposit Insurance,and Banking Crises

This paper empirically investigates two issues largely unexplored by the literature on market discipline. We evaluate the interaction between market discipline and deposit insurance and the impact of banking crises on market discipline. We focus on the experiences of Argentina, Chile, and Mexico during the 1980s and 1990s. We find that depositors discipline banks by withdrawing deposits and by requiring higher interest rates. Deposit insurance does not appear to diminish the extent of market discipline. Aggregate shocks affect deposits and interest rates during crises, regardless of bank fundamentals, and investors' responsiveness to bank risk taking increases in the aftermath of crises.     

Rules versus discretion in loan rate setting

Loan rates for seemingly identical borrowers often exhibit substantial dispersion. This paper investigates the determinants of the dispersion in interest rates on loans granted by banks to small and medium sized enterprises. We associate this dispersion with the loan officers’ use of “discretion” in the loan rate setting process. We find that “discretion” is most important if: (i) loans are small and unsecured; (ii) firms are small and opaque; (iii) the firm operates in a large and highly concentrated banking market; and (iv) the firm is distantly located from the lender. Consistent with the proliferation of information-technologies in the banking industry, we find a decreasing role for “discretion” over time in the provision of small credits to opaque firms. While widely used in the pricing of loans, “discretion” plays only a minor role in the decisions to grant loans.     

A darker side to decentralized banks: Market power and credit rationing in SME lending

We use loan-level data to study how the organizational structure of banks impacts small business lending. We find that decentralized banks—where branch managers have greater autonomy over lending decisions—give larger loans to small firms and those with “soft information.” However, decentralized banks are also more responsive to their own competitive environment. They are more likely to expand credit when faced with competition but also cherry pick customers and restrict credit when they have market power. This “darker side” to decentralized banks in concentrated markets highlights that the level of local banking competition is key to determining which organizational structure provides better lending terms for small businesses.