Investment in Technology: Does It Proliferate the Profitability and Performance of the Indian Banks?

Abstract

This study gauges the profitability and performance of Indian commercial banks under the technology advancements. In this study, the authors identified three domains that give advantage to banks due to technology incorporation, that is, increased sales revenue, reduced operating expenses, and increased employee productivity. The authors assess the effect of these domains on banks’ profitability and performance. This study is conducted for the period between the years 2003 and 2018 across 34 public and private banks for empirical analysis. The authors examined the impact of investment in technology on the profitability using panel data analysis and evaluated the long-term effect of technology investment using the vector error correction model. This study found that there is a mixed effect of technology spend on the profitability and performance of Indian banks, where private sector banks are more aggressive in technology investment as compared to the public sector banks. This study recommends an optimal technology-related strategy to gain improved productivity for the banking business, that is, planned technology reserves, customer awareness campaigns about technology-enabled products, and robust employee–customer motivation policy.