Long-term developments of respondent financial product portfolios in the EU: a multilevel latent class analysis

Abstract

Segmentation structures can be unstable over time. Therefore, previous research has analyzed panel data in order to provide insight into changes in segmentation structures or switches by individuals between segments. Unfortunately, panel data are often unavailable when analyzing developments across different countries and over longer time-periods. The analysis reported in this paper makes it possible to evaluate differences in segmentation structures across countries at different time-points using multiple cross sectional datasets. This provides indications into long-term cross-national developments of segmentation structures. In the utilized multilevel latent class analysis model respondents are the lower level units and data from the same country and time-point are treated as the higher level units. As an illustrative and salient empirical example we assess similarities and differences in consumer financial product portfolios across 14 EU countries from 1969 to 2003, based on three disaggregate cross-sectional databases.