Mobile banking and financial performance of microfinance institutions in Kenya

Abstract

The Microfinance institutions in Kenya has experienced turbulent times following the collapse of many banks in the 1990s. In order to minimize their operational costs, these institutions banks have adopted internet banking including ATMs, mobile banking and internet banking where customer can access their accounts on their personal computers. Mobile banking offers millions of people a potential solution in emerging markets that have access to a cell phone, yet remain excluded from the financial mainstream. It can make basic financial services more accessible by minimizing time and distance to the nearest retail bank branches as well as reducing the bank‘s own overheads and transaction- related costs. Data on listed firms is readily available and regarded credible for use. Four microfinance institutions were used in the analysis upon which regression analysis and the SPSS analytical software were used to analyze the data. The research found that there was a significant relationship between mobile banking and financial performance of the microfinance institutions. Microfinance financial performance was also found to vary in the different years under study. Mobile banking was therefore one of the factors that influenced the value of the microfinance financial performance. Further research is therefore necessary to establish the effect of the same in other categories of even major financial institutions