Future research directions of mergers and acquisitions in the banking sector: A review based on bibliometric analysis

Abstract

The banking sector plays an indispensable role in the global economy by facilitating economic growth, providing financial services, and ensuring the stability of the financial system. The banking industry is one of the most dynamic sectors, where financial institutions are constantly striving to achieve a strategic advantage over their peers. One such effective strategy is mergers and acquisitions (M&A), where banks consolidate their operations through either a merger or an acquisition to achieve strategic objectives. The purpose of this paper is to undertake a review of mergers and acquisitions in the banking industry using bibliometric analysis to identify their technical reasons, significance, and effects and to offer thematic and methodological directions for further studies to move forward on the topic. Bibliometric analysis, including citation, bibliographic coupling, coauthorship, and co-occurrence analysis, was utilized to discover trends in and conduct descriptive analysis of articles. The study used keyword and reference search methods to discover 616 research articles from the Scopus database between 1994 and 2022. Publication trends, highly influential authors, leading nations, and top journals are addressed. Hence, the systematic review of the most cited articles has been performed significantly. The study summarizes the significance, effects, and performance evaluation of mergers and acquisitions in the banking sector using both bibliometric and systematic analysis, which will enable academicians and researchers to make significant contributions to future research directions on mergers and acquisitions in the banking sector.