Naslov (eng)

What drives efficiency of insurance companies in Western Balkan countries?

Autor

Rakonjac Antić, Tatjana
Koprivica, Marija
Kočović, Jelena

Opis (eng)

ABSTRACT This study investigates the technical efficiency of insurance companies in five Western Balkan countries between 2015 and 2022, using a two-stage double bootstrap data envelopment analysis (DEA). In the first stage, bias-corrected DEA efficiency scores are calculated. The second stage employs the bootstrapped truncated regression to investigate relationships between firm characteristics and these efficiencies. Our findings indicate that insurance companies in Serbia exhibit the highest level of technical efficiency, while their counterparts in Albania display the lowest level. Five key drivers of insurer efficiency are identified: firm size, specialisation, growth, solvency, and profitability, while the effect of ownership structure is not statistically significant. Further analysis of returns to scale indicates that most large and medium-sized insurers in Western Balkan countries operate under decreasing returns to scale (DRS). In contrast, most small insurers exhibit increasing returns to scale (IRS). This research contributes to a better understanding of factors influencing the efficiency of insurance companies in developing countries, with implications for insurance regulators, strategic management within the industry, and future research endeavours.

Opis (eng)

The research was supported by the Ministry of Science, Technological Development and Innovations of the Republic of Serbia.

Opis (eng)

SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL Supplementary data to this article can be found online at https://doi.org/10.1556/032.2025.00002.

Jezik

engleski

Datum

2025

Licenca

© All rights reserved

Predmet

KEYWORDS: insurance industry, technical efficiency, data envelopment analysis (DEA), two-stage double bootstrap, returns to scale, developing countries

Deo kolekcije (1)

o:28218

Ekonomski fakultet