O advento das tecnologias digitais e a difusão da "world wide web" (www) expandiram as atividades de comunicação pública em direção a um amplo leque de novos agentes publicadores, muito além do setor midiático tradicional. Nesse contexto, embora exista uma literatura numerosa e recente de estudos diagnosticando o uso dos recursos da nova mídia pelo setor midiático tradicional, tais estudos ainda inexistem para os novos agentes publicadores recém-surgidos, entre os quais o setor bancário brasileiro ocupa uma posição de destaque proporcionada por sua vocação, historicamente demonstrada, para o uso de tecnologia. Dessa forma, a dissertação se propõe a estudar como os bancos no Brasil – e em especial os que operam no mercado de varejo – se desempenham enquanto agentes publicadores de conteúdos na nova mídia. / The advent of digital technologies and the diffusion of the world wide web (www) have expanded the boundaries of massive communication activities towards a wide range of new players, much beyond the traditional media sector. Within this context, despite the existence of a recent, prolific literature diagnosing the use of new media resources by the traditional media sector, such analyses have not been developed yet for the range of newly appeared players, among which the Brazilian banking sector occupies a position of prominence due to its historically demonstrated technological vocation. Therefore, the dissertation is focused on studying how the banking institutions in Brazil, and especially those operating in the retail banking segment, perform their tasks as new media publishers.

O advento das tecnologias digitais e a difusão da "world wide web" (www) expandiram as atividades de comunicação pública em direção a um amplo leque de novos agentes publicadores, muito além do setor midiático tradicional. Nesse contexto, embora exista uma literatura numerosa e recente de estudos diagnosticando o uso dos recursos da nova mídia pelo setor midiático tradicional, tais estudos ainda inexistem para os novos agentes publicadores recém-surgidos, entre os quais o setor bancário brasileiro ocupa uma posição de destaque proporcionada por sua vocação, historicamente demonstrada, para o uso de tecnologia. Dessa forma, a dissertação se propõe a estudar como os bancos no Brasil – e em especial os que operam no mercado de varejo – se desempenham enquanto agentes publicadores de conteúdos na nova mídia. / The advent of digital technologies and the diffusion of the world wide web (www) have expanded the boundaries of massive communication activities towards a wide range of new players, much beyond the traditional media sector. Within this context, despite the existence of a recent, prolific literature diagnosing the use of new media resources by the traditional media sector, such analyses have not been developed yet for the range of newly appeared players, among which the Brazilian banking sector occupies a position of prominence due to its historically demonstrated technological vocation. Therefore, the dissertation is focused on studying how the banking institutions in Brazil, and especially those operating in the retail banking segment, perform their tasks as new media publishers.

La presente investigación se realizó con el objetivo de determinar si impacto financiero de los contratos de asociación en participación conforme la NIIF 11 “Acuerdos Conjuntos” en los bancos del sector retail. Para llevar a cabo la validación de nuestra hipótesis, hemos encuestado a los principales bancos del sector retail de Lima. Se realizó un caso práctico bajo dos escenarios, el cual ayudará a evaluar el impacto financiero de nuestro tema de investigación. De los datos analizados podemos concluir que implementar la NIIF 11 generaría un impacto financiero favorable para los bancos del sector retail. Esto se llevaría a cabo bajo la figura de consorcio. / The present investigation was carried out with the objective of determining the financial impact of the joint venture agreements under IFRS 11 "Joint Agreements" in the banks of the retail sector. To carry out the validation of our hypothesis, we have surveyed the main banks of the Lima retail sector. A practical case was carried out under two scenarios, which will help to evaluate the financial impact of our research topic. From the data analyzed, we can conclude that implementing IFRS 11 would generate a favorable financial impact for banks in the retail sector. This would be carried out under the consortium figure. / Tesis

In this thesis, I investigate economic and policy implications of individual choice decisions, including consumers’ choices among differentiated products and households’ decisions on intra-household resource allocations. In the first chapter, I develop a consumer demand model for US retail banking services in which consumers have preference over the geographical convenience of their banks’ networks. The purpose of the study is to identify consumers’ taste for branch network convenience in the US banking industry and to assess the effect of this demand motive on bank revenues, consumer surplus, and market structure. I show that consumers value the geographical convenience of their bank branch network to a large extent. Specifically, a branch that is one mile closer is equivalent to a branch with a 0.4 percent higher annual interest rate. Furthermore, consumers value proximity of the branch network to both their residence and workplace. The counterfactual experiment shows that banks with a larger number of branches enjoy greater network benefits in terms of revenue. Meanwhile, consumers benefit from the reduction in their expected travel distance by choosing depository institutions with large-scale networks. The second chapter examines how parents adjust bride-prices and land divisions to compensate their sons for differences in their schooling expenditures in rural China. The model is tested using data from a unique household interview survey carried out in Hebei Province. The main estimate implies that when a son receives one yuan less in schooling investment than his brother, he will obtain 0.7 yuan more in observable marital and post-marital transfers as partial compensation. This marginal compensation estimate is quantitatively larger than any comparable estimate using North American data, suggesting that the unitary model is a useful model of resource allocation for sons in traditional agricultural families. As a supplement to Chapter 2, Chapter 3 investigates matchmakers’ negotiation role in rural Chinese marriages and its impact on marital transfer from the parents to the children at the time of marriage. Using a unique household-level dataset collected in Hebei province, I find that a negotiator’s involvement can raise the total marital transfer by 20 percent, which supports my public goods story.

In this thesis, I investigate economic and policy implications of individual choice decisions, including consumers’ choices among differentiated products and households’ decisions on intra-household resource allocations. In the first chapter, I develop a consumer demand model for US retail banking services in which consumers have preference over the geographical convenience of their banks’ networks. The purpose of the study is to identify consumers’ taste for branch network convenience in the US banking industry and to assess the effect of this demand motive on bank revenues, consumer surplus, and market structure. I show that consumers value the geographical convenience of their bank branch network to a large extent. Specifically, a branch that is one mile closer is equivalent to a branch with a 0.4 percent higher annual interest rate. Furthermore, consumers value proximity of the branch network to both their residence and workplace. The counterfactual experiment shows that banks with a larger number of branches enjoy greater network benefits in terms of revenue. Meanwhile, consumers benefit from the reduction in their expected travel distance by choosing depository institutions with large-scale networks. The second chapter examines how parents adjust bride-prices and land divisions to compensate their sons for differences in their schooling expenditures in rural China. The model is tested using data from a unique household interview survey carried out in Hebei Province. The main estimate implies that when a son receives one yuan less in schooling investment than his brother, he will obtain 0.7 yuan more in observable marital and post-marital transfers as partial compensation. This marginal compensation estimate is quantitatively larger than any comparable estimate using North American data, suggesting that the unitary model is a useful model of resource allocation for sons in traditional agricultural families. As a supplement to Chapter 2, Chapter 3 investigates matchmakers’ negotiation role in rural Chinese marriages and its impact on marital transfer from the parents to the children at the time of marriage. Using a unique household-level dataset collected in Hebei province, I find that a negotiator’s involvement can raise the total marital transfer by 20 percent, which supports my public goods story.

Due to the increased number of niched retail banks in Sweden, the competition for the customers has become severe. Bank customers in the Swedish bank market tend to stay with their bank. The challenge of how to manage to attract new customers is a central part of the retail banks’ management tasks. The research area on which we have been focusing on is the area of consumer behavior. We have been focusing on student switching behavior of financial services provided by retail banks in general and ICA banken in particular. To strengthen the practical connection, we choose to focus on the case of ICA banken. Our objective was to investigate which predictors that affect switching intention and investigate how these predictors affect students’ switching behavior, which in the extension will contribute to how retail banks can work towards manage these rising issues. We formulated the following research question: How do the predictors of switching intention affect switching behavior in the retail banking context? Our purpose was to investigate the predictors of switching intention and their effects on switching behavior in the retail banking context. The study was performed with a quantitative method and a deductive approach. By using a convenience sampling technique, we collected the data electronically. The population examined was the student segment at Umeå University. Our questionnaire was constructed with the theoretical chapter as framework, and the discussion, conclusion and practical implications are based on our empirical findings. Our study was geographically limited to Umeå University. The ability to generalize our findings was also limited, due to our chosen sampling technique. We reached a conclusion that the greatest predictor of switching intention was attitude towards switching. Additionally, the greatest predictors of switching behavior was a combination of attitude towards switching and customer satisfaction. Our practical implications consisted of the recommendation for retail banks to focus on developing marketing strategies that would bank customers more positive towards the act of switching bank in order to attract new customers. Our findings showed that bank customers in general were neither negative nor positive towards the act of switching bank. For ICA banken we gave three proposals; to attract new customers, to transform customers that only partly use the bank to customers that use ICA banken for the majority of their financial transactions and to maintain current customers. These actions are made by managing customer satisfaction, brand image, the relational investment between ICA banken and customers, and subjective norms since these should affect the attitude towards switching bank.

Submitted in fulfillment of the requirements of the Degree of Master of Technology: Marketing, Durban University of Technology, 2012. / The aim of this study is to investigate service quality at retail banks, such as Standard Bank, ABSA Bank, First National Bank and Nedbank in Durban. The four objectives of this study are set as: Firstly, to identify the level of satisfaction with customer service received from different retail banks in Durban; Secondly, to identify customers’ expectations in terms of quality services provided by retail banks; Thirdly, to ascertain the perceptions of customers towards the service provided by retail banks in Durban; Fourthly, to measure the gaps between customer expectations and perceptions of service quality, using a modified version of the SERVQUAL model. The instrument used to assess the retail bank customer’s expectation and expectations of service quality, was the SERVQUAL questionnaire, measuring expectations and perceptions according to five quality dimensions. A total of 448 students were surveyed. Quota sampling was used in this study, in order to improve representativeness. Using quota sampling involves selecting the characteristics that are required in the sample and then sampling until enough representatives of each category are achieved. Although this is a form of non-probability sampling, a quota sample can provide a good approximation to a probability sample. It means that distributing questionnaires to a certain group would be stopped after the prescribed quota is reached. Data were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistical techniques. Conclusions and recommendations were thereafter drawn from the literature and the findings of the study. The study shows that retail bank customer expectations of service quality exceeded their perceptions in the five service quality dimensions used in the SERVQUAL questionnaire. This study is also important because it will assist bank managers to convert negative perceptions to positive impressions. Consequently, customers will benefit from the improved, outstanding customer service.

Torn by having to meet the external demands of customers for quality service and internal demands for achieving sales targets, achieving a balance is not an easy task for traditional service units in fields such as retail banking, retailing, telecommunications, travel industry, and the like. This study examines the issue through the lens of an organizational ambidexterity framework. In the management literature, ambidexterity is used as a metaphor to describe an organization???s ability to perform seemingly conflicting tasks or pursue disparate goals simultaneously (Lubatkin et al., 2006). As an emerging research area, ambidexterity studies address the issue of how an organization can pursue multiple goals simultaneously (Benner & Tushman, 2003). The study has three specific objectives: 1) to conceptualize ambidexterity in the context of service and sales in a retail bank setting; 2) to identify and empirically examine the antecedents of branch ambidexterity; and 3) to examine the impact of ambidexterity on branch financial performance. Based on resource-based view and organization-context literature, the present study focuses on the impact of employee characteristics and contextual variables on branch ambidexterity and, ultimately, branch-level financial performance. The study uses both a qualitative and a quantitative approach. Data are collected from two large retail banks, one in Australia and one in Thailand. Findings are reported in three different studies. Study one reports findings based on the qualitative phase. Studies two and three report findings based on the quantitative data. A qualitative approach involves five bank branches and conducting a series of in-depth interviews with branch managers and frontline staff. It identifies employee constructs that have a positive or a negative impact on branch ambidexterity. These constructs are goal orientation, self-efficacy, and role stress. The role of branch context is also discussed. The quantitative approach involves data from 2,306 employees in 267 branches in a large Thai bank. Hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) is used to analyze the data. The quantitative data are used to test two models. The first model explores the direct impact of employees??? characteristics on branch ambidexterity. It is found that goal orientation, self-efficacy, and role stress are significantly associated with branch ambidexterity. The inclusion of transformational leadership as a moderator provides additional insights into the relationship between employee characteristics and branch ambidexterity. The second model tests the direct impact of contextual variables on branch ambidexterity. The contextual variables include empowerment, team support, fairness of rewards, and transformational leadership. Finally, it explores the impact of branch ambidexterity on branch financial performance. Data suggest that all four contextual variables make significant positive contributions to branch ambidexterity at the individual level. However, only empowerment, team support, and fairness of rewards have a significant group-level effect on branch ambidexterity. It is also found that branch ambidexterity is positively related to branch financial performance.

Zugl.: Reichartshausen, European Business School, Diss., 2008. / Hergestellt on demand.

Thesis (doctoral)--Universität St. Gallen, 2008.