Impact of IT investments on efficiency in Argentinean banks

Abstract

Information Technology (IT) represents an essential tool in the achievement of competitive advantages within a highly dynamic context. It is important to understand the impact it has on the development of organizations, especially in sectors like banking, which make extensive use of information. The present work presents a model to evaluate the impact of investment in IT on bank efficiency. Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) was selected as our efficiency meas-urement tool, with our model built upon financial statement information from Argentine banks. The results showed that the banks presented a high level of global efficiency. Local branches of foreign financial institutions and local banks with foreign capital proved to be the most efficient.