Measuring post-crisis productivity for Jamaican banks

The study examines the changes to total factor productivity of Jamaican banks between 1998 and 2007. Using Data Envelopment Analysis with bootstrap to construct a Malmquist index, bank productivity is measured and decomposed into technical progress and efficiency. The results suggest an inconsistent growth pattern for banks between 1998 and 2007 driven mainly by efficiency gains in the immediate post-crisis period to 2002, and by technological progress towards the end of the sample period. The second largest banks along with merchant and locally-owned banks showed significant productivity growth in some models, with modest growth for commercial and foreign-owned banks.