A Note on Management Efficiency and International Banking. Some Empirical Panel Evidence

Abstract

This analysis focuses on the assumption that management efficiency is one of the most important company-specific factors affecting a bank's international activities. The theoretical results on whether good or bad management influences international activities in banking are mixed. We attempt to let the data speak for itself, applying advanced panel-econometric regression models to a dataset covering 747 universal banks based in Austria for the period running from 1995 to 2002. The dataset is unique in the sense that it provides almost full coverage of a banking sector at the company level that expanded foreign operations during the period covered on an unprecedented scale at the time. We find that management efficiency as measured by X-efficiency affects the degree of a bank's international orientation positively. In addition, risk-based capital and international orientation in banking is positively related.