Creating Value in Financial Services

This work portrays the recognition that the financial services industry is undergoing an ever-increasing rate of change, and that management tools for dealing with this change are not current. It is driven by the twin revolutions of disintermediation and deregulation and combined with technology to form a competitive force within the industry. Recognizing the need for a multi-disciplinary approach to the problem, the editors of this work have called upon colleagues at academic and business institutions to fashion a resource for those who wish to understand the challenges that lie ahead. Whether they write about distribution, regulation, consolidation or diversification, the authors provide a description of the problems and an analysis of potential solutions. Chapters identify sources of value-added for end-users, skews in customer profitability and the increase in consumer price sensitivity that will make profitability in financial services more difficult to attain. As technology improves, customers will have the ability to choose from an assortment of specialized providers to write cheques, make deposits, transfer money, get cash, and pay bills via the Internet. Providers will have to innovate or face a competitive climate of commodity pricing. It will likely result in pressures on firm profits and employee earnings, while providing favourable opts for customers.