Mobile Apps and Financial Decision Making

Bruce Carlin; Arna  Olafsson; Michaela Pagel

doi:10.1093/rof/rfac040

Mobile Apps and Financial Decision Making

Bruce Carlin, Arna Olafsson^*, Michaela Pagel

^*Corresponding author for this work

Department of Finance

Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review

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Abstract

We exploit the release of a mobile application for a financial aggregation platform to analyze how technology adoption changes consumer financial decision making. The app reduced the cost of accessing personal financial information, and we find that this led to a drop in non-sufficient fund (NSF) fees. Because of the manner in which these fees are incurred, this represents an unambiguous welfare improvement for users of the platform. The leading explanation for this result appears to be mistake avoidance due to easier access to information.

Original language	English
Journal	Review of Finance
Volume	27
Issue number	3
Pages (from-to)	977-996
Number of pages	20
ISSN	1572-3097
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1093/rof/rfac040
Publication status	Published - May 2023

Bibliographical note

Published online: 29 June 2022.

Keywords

Household finance
Mobile apps
Financial mistakes
Bank fees
Attention to personal finances
Access to financial information
Bank data

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Cite this

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abstract = "We exploit the release of a mobile application for a financial aggregation platform to analyze how technology adoption changes consumer financial decision making. The app reduced the cost of accessing personal financial information, and we find that this led to a drop in non-sufficient fund (NSF) fees. Because of the manner in which these fees are incurred, this represents an unambiguous welfare improvement for users of the platform. The leading explanation for this result appears to be mistake avoidance due to easier access to information.",

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KW - Attention to personal finances

KW - Access to financial information

KW - Bank data

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KW - Financial mistakes

KW - Bank fees

KW - Attention to personal finances

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