Papers presented by Bernardo Batiz-Lazo since 2019

2025 Atlanta, Georgia

"The Digitalization of Mexican Retail Banking: The Case of Banamex, 1970s-2010s"

Abstract:

Banco Nacional de Mexico (Banamex), established in 1884 and became the largest and leading retail bank in the country throughout the 20th century. Banamex was nationalised in 1982, privatised in 1992 and sold to foreign capital in 2001 (Citi Group). As has been documented through internal corporate histories, the work of Gustavo del Angel and others, Banamex was a technological trail-blazer throughout most of its history. But in the 21st century it lost business and technological leadership, due to strategic decisions made by the parent company. These decisions ended the almost total freedom at the Mexican subsidiary and brought a large number of business units (including the management of information systems) in line with and following precepts and practices of the US parent. This paper contributes to prior scholarship by documenting the process of automation of retail banking at Banamex from the early 20th century up to recent times. The paper builds on that scholarship, plus oral histories with managers and engineers deeply involved in the design and development of its computer systems since the 1970s. Fieldwork also benefited from a short survey of some 60 branch personnel in 2023. As a result, the paper´s story provides an arc of the process of automation from its beginnings to present day. In particular, it offers new insights into the process of back-office automation through the innovative creation of a so-called “core banking” application in the early 1990s. This architecture was then redesigned in the late 2000s and early 2010s, to suit the “silo” or business unit needs of the parent company. The paper then reflects on the link between an erroneous automation strategy and the loss of market share in the mid to late 2010s.

Keywords:

2022 Mexico City

"Early Forms of FinTech: Experiments in Delivering Banking Services"

Abstract:

This paper explores competition and collaboration between banks and retailers to overcome the challenges of automating on-the-spot transactions in the USA during the 1970s and early 1980s. Existing literature documents how banks have contended with, and responded to the emergence of new technologies since at least the 1890s when technical devices focused on improving “back office” operations started to be introduced. It was though in the late 1960s, and early 1970s that information and communication technologies, in particular Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT), emerged and grew in a way that really impacted consumers, and consumers’ relationships with their banks and retailers. This paper focuses on this triangular relationship between consumer, bank and retailer. We depart from previous research on the automation of banking and retailing to focus on co-competition between retail financial institutions and grocery chains to solve the problem of digitalising on-the-spot transactions. The 1970s were a unique period in US history, witnessing the end of the Vietnam War and Bretton Woods, rising inflation, oil shocks, Nixon’s resignation, the rise of Japan Inc., the further advancement of women and people of colour in the workforce, continued suburban flight and the questioning of the American management mystique. Within this turbulent context, the early steps towards a cashless-digital economy were taken, but not without critics. Using archival data, we examine early experiments with, and the adoption of, EFT by savings and loans associations (S&Ls) in the United States. The paper focuses on the introduction of Point of Sale installations by S&Ls in retail locations that allowed customers to make deposits and withdrawals, while also enabling retailers to verify balances and support bank checking. By examining these early experiments in digital innovation, we better understand the factors driving the adoption of new, customer facing technology in the financial sector, and shed light on role of differences in gender, ethnicity and geography within the US during the early stages of financialisation.

Keywords:

2022 Mexico City

"Gender and Financialisation of Retail Banking in Spain, 1950-1975"

Abstract:

Abstract This paper uses access to a previously unexplored archive or Spanish´s banks marketing material to argue a shift in Braudel´s concept of "longue duree", namely the access of large number of women to the retail banking sector without explicit approval of their husband or father. Between 1950 and 1975, a censorship service (and integral part of the institutions during Franco´s dictatorship) was deployed within the Spanish central bank (Banco de España) to control and supervise all of the banks´ marketing. An examination of surviving printed material enables us to map a shift in the strategies of banks into large scale consumer banking and indeed the start of a new period which some have labelled “financialization”. We identify three “events” or moments in this shift in which women appear first as a decorative figure, second early steps to attract women as customers, and third outright targeting of women customers. Here the pathbreaking role of Banco de Bilbao takes centre stage as it began stage two before there had been a regulatory change in 1971, enabling women to open accounts or acquire personal loans without the husband’s approval. We also reflect on how marketing to women a channel for the eventual direct marketing of retail financial services to adolescents and children was. The database enables us to map how other large, medium and small commercial banks followed the Bilbao. The database ends abruptly with the dead of the dictator. This paper thus contributes to the history of marketing and the business history of banking but also sheds light in to the less explored beginning of financialisaton of every day life. This paper can be delivered in English or Spanish by Bernardo Bátiz-Lazo (Susana Martínez will take part through video conference).

Keywords:

2022 Mexico City

"Expanding and integrating Spanish banks networks and systems in Latin America "

Abstract:

Topic: Revisit the extant literature on the growth of Spanish banks in Latin America through the analysis of the processes of IT integration. We explore the implementation of global platforms (developed by either third parties or at head office) which replaced, interfaced or co-existed with pre-existing local IT and management systems. Argument: The exponential growth of Banco Santander and BBVA in Latin America, taking advantage of the general process of banking liberalisation, represented a very complex technological and management challenge. However, the extant literature to date has emphasised the latter and been mute on the former (e.g. Guillen and Tschoegl, 2000; Martin Aceña, 2009). We revisit this lacuna while building upon the seminal contributions of Yates (1989 and 2005), Capmbell-Kelly (1992) and Cortada (2006 and 2011), which provide a framework to explore the construction of global banks as these entities tried to implement platforms they had developed and tested in Spain in diverse competitive environment while dealing with entities of different size and longevity. We document experiences of internal transformation of acquired banks to new IT management systems in different product lines, and how they achieved coordination between platforms at head office, local back-office systems, and the generation of tools accessible to customers while balancing the perceived costs, benefits and risks (regulatory, market, reputational, operative, etc.) in IT implementation. Evidence: This paper combines the reinterpretation of secondary sources with interviews and oral histories of IT and banking specialists at the holding company in Spain, the acquired institutions and contemporary regulators in Latin America.

Keywords:

2021 Hopin Virtual Events Platform

"From Redlining to M-Pesa: The Role of the Entrepreneurial State Behind Innovative Technology to Deliver an Inclusive Financial Sector "

Abstract:

The actions of the state are consistently erased from the narrative of innovation within financialised capitalism. This paper contributes to the body of literature on the entrepreneurial state by documenting how state intervention in developing economies is not limited to capital intensive projects and proven technologies but helps to develop markets and facilitate innovation and entrepreneurship, ultimately leading to economic growth. We also document how entrepreneurial states collaborate across borders. These ideas are exemplified by the evolution of state intervention in Kenya leading to the emergence of the world-recognised mobile payment service M-Pesa. The case of M-Pesa illustrates how public-private partnerships, the collaboration in search for commercial opportunities by British and Kenyan governments, together with an enabling regulatory environment, facilitate technological innovation as a means of enhancing financial inclusion. This discussion emphasises the role played by the state, in contrast to that of the private sector and disruptive innovation.

Keywords: