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This paper examines the relation between fintech-based inclusive finance and bank efficiency using annual unbalanced data of 318 banks from 7 dual-banking countries over the period of 2011 to 2020. It measures bank efficiency using the data envelopment analysis (DEA) and then applies the Simar-Wilson bootstrapping regression to measure the influence of fintech-based financial inclusion on bank efficiency. From the efficiency measures, we note that Islamic banks are more efficient than their conventional counterparts. Our regression analysis indicates that fintech-based inclusive finance is positively related to bank efficiency, implying that greater implementation of digitally integrated financial system improves banking efficiency. Our findings are robust in alternative estimation methods. Our study provides some policy implications for policymakers, standard setters, and regulators.

In this paper, we investigate the differential impact of ESG activities on banks’ technical efficiency for conventional and Islamic banks. We employ a Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) technique to determine the efficiency scores of the banks. Based on a sample of 14 conventional and 11 Islamic banks from 4 countries over the period 2011 - 2019, we find that average DEA-generated efficiency of conventional (Islamic) banks is about 38.8% (42.45%). Baseline Tobit regressions suggest that ESG has an overall positive impact on banks’ efficiency. Further, we analyze the relationship for conventional and Islamic banks separately. We find that the positive effect sustains for conventional banks but turns out to be insignificant for Islamic banks. Our individual ESG dimension-wise analyses suggest that environmental activities positively influence the efficiency of both conventional and Islamic banks, whereas social activities strengthen the efficiency of conventional banks only. We do not find any significant result in favor of governance-related initiatives. Our baseline results survive the robustness test based on Simar and Wilson (2007) two-stage efficiency analysis. Based on our findings, we argue that Islamic banks lack sufficient investment on ESG friendly initiatives. We recommend that Islamic banks increase their awareness of the benefits of ESG practices and pay attention to improve their overall and dimension-wise ESG scores with a goal to improve their banking efficiency.

This paper examines the nexus between digital financial inclusion (DFI) and levels of bank risk-taking, using a sample of 283 commercial banks (Islamic and conventional) from six countries over the period 2011 to 2019 and deploying panel-corrected standard errors, two-stage least squares-instrumental variables and dynamic panel two-step generalized method of moments estimators. The findings suggest that Islamic banks take more risks than their counterpart conventional banks. The empirical evidence also indicates that an increase in the DFI index score reduces the overall level of bank risktaking and increases that of banking stability for commercial and conventional banks compared to Islamic ones. A strong association between DFI and bank risk-taking suggests that DFI not only reduces the default risk, leverage risk and portfolio risk of banks, but also increases financial mobility in the sample countries. Consequently, an inclusive digitalised banking industry ensures sustainable economic growth, which is likely to help maintain financial sustainability in times of crisis such as the Covid-19 pandemic. Our results are shown to be robust by various robustness checks. The study contributes to both the Islamic and conventional banking, as well as the digital financial inclusion, literature. The findings of the study provide various policy implications for policymakers and standard-setters in the countries examined.

This paper aims to estimate the efficiency scores of 153 Islamic banks of 32 countries during the period 2011 to 2017 by deploying data envelopment analysis and Simar–Wilson double bootstrapping regression techniques to determine how financial inclusion and its interaction effect with GDP growth impact on Islamic banking efficiency to promote inclusive sustainable growth. The findings show that the efficiency trends of Islamic banks in most countries have been inconsistent in the aftermath of the global financial crisis; this indicates that the banking industry is still bearing the consequences of that recession. However, Islamic banks in Bangladesh, Malaysia, Mauritia, Qatar, Tunisia, and Sudan are performing efficiently and, in spite of being war-affected countries, Islamic banks in Iraq and Palestine, more interestingly, have also seen an ascending trend in terms of improving their efficiency levels. The results foreground that to improve Islamic banks’ efficiency, financial inclusion (FI) must play a key role. Moreover, the effect of the interaction between FI and GDP growth suggests that FI plays a significant role in sustainable development, which creates a positive relationship between inclusive sustainable growth and the efficiency of Islamic banks. Since research on FI is an ongoing process, this paper contributes to the existing literature and methodology pertinent to the subject by analysing both non-bias and bias-corrected efficiency through the utilisation of more recent data from Islamic banks.