Tracking the Impact of Change in Ownership on the Efficiency of Commercial Banks in MENA Countries using a Malmquist Index-Based Approach

Abstract The aim of this research is to track the impact of ownership including mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in the MENA-region’s banking industry on the technical efficiency of its commercial banking units, technical efficiency being the goodness in transforming inputs into outputs. To assess such change, this paper uses Malmquist Productivity Index (MPI) analysis. This index uses the yearly efficiency coefficients provided by Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) to analyze the evolution of efficiency over time. Moreover, the index is decomposed into two components, one reflecting the intrinsic change in the relative efficiency and one reflecting the shift in the efficient frontier. The conclusions from this study and the results it reports confirm the positive, though limited, impact of change in ownership on the overall efficiency of the commercial banking industry in MENA region, though one needs to be cautious since the sample did not include all banks operating in the region. Arabic Abstract: