The spread of the Internet and the transformation of the European banking industry: "commoditization".

Summary The deregulation of the banking market associated with the rapid and massive spread of new information technologies has transformed the banking industry, pushing both the existing banks and the new entrants to compete according to new criteria and new strategies. The Internet seems to favor the implementation of an important "commoditization" process. This research work consists of an analysis of the effects of the diffusion of the Internet on the evolution of the structures, the behaviors and the organization of the banking industry. The first part of the thesis presents the first factor leading to this diffusion, the development of a new financial innovation called "Internet banking". This first part studies the context but also the impact and the limits of this innovation. The second part of the thesis examines the effects of the second factor, the "shopbots", on the evolution of banking supply and demand. The analysis of the effects of a frequent use of shopbots (by Internet users) on the possibilities of developing a commoditization process in this industry is at the heart of our problematic. This empirical analysis studies the reaction of European banking actors through an examination of banking strategies of appropriation and protection of rents. These transformations are at the heart of industrial economics, and are the result of a major technological diffusion in a deregulated market.