An investigation into the cost efficiency, scale economies, technological progress and productivity of Algerian banks

Abstract EN

This study investigates the cost efficiency, scale economies, technological progress and total factor productivity growth of Algerian banks.

To accomplish this, we us a sample of all the commercial banks operating in Algeria over the period 2003– 2016.

Results show that banks are wasting 16% of their cost of production, foreign banks of all sizes exhibited economies of scale, whereas public banks of all sizes exhibited diseconomies of scale.

Results also show that technological progress reduced the cost of production of banks, and that bank productivity increased over the study period.