FINTECH AND BANK EFFICIENCY: EVIDENCE FROM MENA COUNTRIES.

Abstract

The financial system around the globe is witnessing revolutionary changes due to the emergence of new innovative financial technologies and solutions. The advantages of Fintech development are undeniable, its growth is rapid around the globe, and adopting these technologies into the financial industry is essential for competitiveness. The purpose of this thesis is to analyze the effect of FinTech on the banks' efficiency in selected countries from the MENA region. A panel of 63 banks over the period from 2011 to 2021 are analyzed from 6 countries: Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait, Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon. We show that as Fintech adoption increases bank efficiency increases as well. Our results are robust to a set of robustness check and to addressing the endogeneity issues using the instrumental variable approach.