همگرایی بهره وری کل عوامل در میان بانک ها: تجربه هنگ کنگ

Are the less productive banks catching up to the more productive ones and, if so, how quickly and by what means? The objective of this study is to answer these questions by looking for convergence in total factor productivity (TFP) among banks in Hong Kong. Past research has identified two major factors governing productivity in the banking sector–scale economies and X-efficiency. If the gains from scale economies decline with firm size and the only difference between banks lies in their initial size, the initially smaller banks should eventually catch up to the initially larger ones because the former tends to grow more rapidly. However, the findings from this study do not support this hypothesis of “absolute convergence.” Indeed, the findings show strong evidence for “conditional convergence,” which means that the steady-state TFP to which a bank is converging is conditional on the bank's own level of X-efficiency. Conditional convergence implies that initial differences in X-efficiency among banks can, between them, create permanent differences in TFP.

Comparison of productivity performance across financial institutions is central to many of the questions concerning factors leading to productivity growth: are less productive financial institutions catching up to the more productive ones, and if so, how quickly and by what means? Groups as disparate as financial economists and business leaders have expressed profound interest in the answer to the question whether the currently best-performing institutions can maintain their roles as productivity leaders in the future. With special reference to the Hong Kong banking industry, this study examines the convergence of productivity among commercial banks.

A comparison of productivity performance across financial institutions is central to answering many of the questions concerning factors leading to the productivity growth of banks: are the less productive banks catching up to the more productive ones and, if so, how quickly and by what means? The objective of this study is to answer these questions by looking for the existence of convergence in total factor productivity among banks in Hong Kong.