Editor’s Introduction 23(1)
Vladimir Zwass, Editor
International Journal of Electronic Commerce,
Volume 23, Number 1, 2019, pp. 1-8.
The special issue that opens this 23rd volume of the International Journal of Electronic Commerce is titled “Finance Big Data: Management, Analysis, and Applications” and has been guest edited by Yunchuan Sun, Yufeng Shi, and Zhengjun Zhang. The guest editors will introduce to you the four papers that present research contributions to several aspects of this important current domain.
The availability of the massive data covering all aspects of our lives and of business activity is bringing profound changes to the financial sector of our economy, a principal component and the enabler of e-commerce. The financial technology (fintech) emerging on the foundation of the Internet–Web has been driving a fundamental change to the functioning of financial institutions. In fact, it is changing the ecosystem of the institutions that provide financial services. Startups of a few years of age challenge the very position of banks, insurance companies, asset-management firms, and exchanges in their core business. A principal reason they can is the collection and activation of massive aggregates of comprehensive data, both longitudinal and real-time in a multiplicity of formats, and bringing it to bear on the marketplaces and services with machine learning and other algorithm classes.
The almost universal internetwork connectivity and mobile accessibility; the exponential growth of computational capabilities, doubling approximately biannually on a very high base in “the second half of the chessboard” as forecasted by Moore’s Law; the progress of machine learning; and the move to cloud computing are all mutually reinforcing and underwrite the Fintech Revolution we are witnessing. We may ascribe the origin of the fintech to the move to electronic screen-based trading on the London Stock Exchange during the Big Bang in 1986. The true revolution has been intensifying over the past two decades, if we wish to date its inception to the launch of PayPal as a person-to-person payment platform in 1998.
At the core, the advantages derived from the deployment of the Big Data in finance can be traced to two overlapping sources. These are the close matching of buyer’s preferences with the seller’s offerings and a more precise risk assessment. The speed and personalization of algorithmic decision making amplify these advantages, hence more efficient markets, innovative business models for the financial intermediaries, and overall advantages to the economies.
An insurance firm with access to a more detailed data profile of an applicant for a policy can offer the terms more closely matching the risk involved than its competitors. It may indeed insure based on a wider set of criteria (say, educational background and stability indicators) than a single credit-rating number. By using machine learning systems to derive new risk criteria from large and expanding data sets, the firm can offer more closely matching terms and bundles to various tranches of prospects and grow its business. The expansion of the business leads to more data and thus more refined neural network algorithms. Hence, the Big Data tips the markets further to big scale—but the scale may be that of Ant Financial Services Group, or Google, or an as-yet-unnamed company rather than that of an insurance firm the name of which has been known to all for a century. It also creates opportunities for startups and innovation to the ever new intermediaries capable of carving out ingenious niches.
The growing and emerging fintech startups have innovated in payments and transaction processing, retail and investment banking, lending, insurance, international remittances, cryptocurrencies, and advisory and money management. The business models of nonbank banks, direct equity placements, crowdfunding, person-to-person lending, and robo-advising are direct threats to the traditional ways of doing business. The incumbent financial institutions resist the future of becoming utilities delivering commodity transactional services to the newcomers owning the client relationships, the principal source of profits. The more agile incumbent firms deploy the advantages of bigness, such as their financial and relationship capital, economies of scale and scope, and access to the regulatory processes, to join the Fintech Revolution. They push to innovate by acquisition and/or by attempting to emulate the agile startups, both not easy to do.
Even more radical disruptions are considered possible with the advance of the Big Data into the financial sector. It is argued that a market price is only provisional as the principal signal that sellers create and to which buyers react [3]. If the signal can be disaggregated into the multiple attributes of the product that would be algorithmically matched with the multiattribute preferences of the buyer (inferred from the profile), the price becomes one of the many attributes. With the diminished informational role of money in such data-rich (or data-driven) markets, the argument goes, the role and profitability of financial institutions would be diminished as well.
It should be stressed that such data-driven marketplaces are categorically different from the visions of centrally planned economies that would substitute for true markets a computerized system (very large) solving a system of equations (very many), such as that propounded by the well-known theoretician of a more realistic economic planning, Oskar Lange [2]. The data-rich markets are based on the actual and specific demand and supply data, where transactions can be concluded at the match between the two. The planned-economy systems are (or were) based on aggregate data without true price signals and can hardly be seen as a way forward.
As the papers included in the special section illustrate, the dramatic changes that are being brought into the financial activities by Big Data present many and various opportunities for research. A comprehensive analytical view of such opportunities is offered by Gomber et al. [1].
The concluding paper in the issue analyzes one of the attributes of product information, namely, product overviews presented by the online retailers in the assortment of their market offerings. Erik Maier investigates the effects of the inconsistency of the product images used in such assortments of products. In the meticulously designed empirics, the author offers us the conclusions regarding the effects of such inconsistencies on the consumers’ evaluations of the assortments and on the consumer-search process. The negatively affected search fluency is found to dominate the potentially salient effect of enhanced consumers’ interest due to the inconsistency. The contribution is thus made here to both theory and practice.
References
- Gomber, P.; Kauffman, R.J.; Parker, C.; and Weber, B.W. On the Fintech Revolution: Interpreting the forces of innovation, disruption, and transformation in financial services. Journal of Management Information Systems, 35, 1 (2018), pp. 220-265.
- Lange, O. The computer and the market. In C.H. Feinstein (ed.), Socialism, Capitalism, and Economic Growth: Essays Presented to Maurice Dobb. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1967, pp. 158–161
- Mayer-Schönberger, V.; and Ramge, T. Reinventing Capitalism in the Age of the Big Data. New York: Basic Books, 2018.
Acknowledgements
The opening of a new volume of IJEC gives me an opportunity to thank our Editorial Board and our referees, the primary guarantors of the quality of the papers we publish. Here are the names of the IJEC reviewers:
W.M.P. van der Aalst
Marc Adam
Hyung Jun Ahn
Jae-Hyeon Ahn
Sonia M. Camacho Ahumada
Tolga Akcura
Pervaiz Alam
Eleftherios Alamanos
Oliver Alexy
Hossam Ali-Hassan
Muhammad Aljukhadar
Tariq Al-Naeem
Paul Alpar
Niek Althuizen
Reina Arakji
Ofer Arazy
Kursad Asdemir
Yoris Au
David Avison
Hyunmi Baek
Kallol Bagchi
Hillol Bala
Siva Balasubramanian
Subhajyoti Bandyopadhyay
Somnath Banerjee
Youngsok Bang
Gaurav Bansal
Reza Barkhi
John “Skip” Benamati
Raquel Benbunan-Fich
Victor Benjamin
Bettina Berendt
Guido Berens
Amit Bhatnagar
Ganesh Bhatt
Martin Bichler
Ivo Blohm
Jesse Bockstedt
Waifong Boh
Indranil Bose
Nicola Breugst
Glenn Browne
Scott Buffett
Jinwei Cao
Lan Cao
Lanlan Cao
Yong Cao
Aihwa Chang
Hsin-lu Chang
Mohamed Hédi Charki
Debabroto Chatterjee
Abhijit Chaudhury
Sophea Chea
Ramnath Chellappa
Andrew Chen
Daniel Chen
Jianqing Chen
Jin Chen
Kuan Chen
Rui Chen
Zeng Chen
Hsing K. Cheng
Xusen Cheng
Christy Cheung
Waiman Cheung
Lei Chi
Robert T.H. Chi
Roger Chiang
Chaochang Chiu
Kyungsub S. Choi
Zeng Chun
Wingyan Chung
John M. Clark
Theodore H. Clark
Randy Cooper
Nicoletta Corrocher
José Carlos Cortizo
Geng Cui
Qizhi Dai
Robert M. Davidson
Jason Dedrick
Elena Delgado-Ballester
Chrysanthos Dellarocas
Haluk Demirkan
Joris Demmers
Xuefei (Nancy) Deng
Charles Dennis
Patrick De Pelsmacker
Douglas Derrick
Sarv Devaraj
Rajiv Dewan
Jasbir Dhaliwal
Tommaso Di Noia
Eugenio Di Sciascio
Soussan Djamasbi
Francesco Donini
Georgios I. Doukidis
William J. Drake
Wenjing Duan
Robert Easley
Christophe Elie-Dit-Cosaque
Sean B. Eom
Andrea Everard
Chun-I Fan
Jing Fan
Ming Fan
Xiaowen Fang
Yu-Hui Fang
Yulin Fang
Alexander Felfernig
Jane Feng
Xiao Feng
Daniel R. Fesenmaier
Pat Finnegan
Jerry Fjermestad
Shixuan Fu
Johann Füller
Brent Furneaux
Dennis F. Galletta
Bashar Gammoh
Dale Ganley
Guodong (Gordon) Gao
Roberto Garcia
Ina Garnefeld
Xianjun Geng
Sonja Gensler
George M. Giaglis
Steven Glover
Paulo Goes
Janis Gogan
Kim Huat Goh
Sigi Goode
Nelson Granados
Dawn Gregg
Ulrike Gretzel
Bin Gu
Gitong Guo
Hong Guo
Xunhua Guo
Zhiling Guo
Saurabh Gupta
Sumeet Gupta
Jungpil Hahn
Kunsoo Han
Shu Han
Dale Hanley
Matthew J. Hashim
Khaled Hassanein
Cheng Suang Heng
Tejaswini Herath
Thomas Hess
Traci J. Hess
Oliver Hinz
Lorin M. Hitt
Chin-Fu Ho
Susanna Ho
Christopher Holland
Yili (Kevin) Hong
Sarah Hsieh
Pei-Fang Hsu
Paul Hu
Qing Hu
Chun-Yao Huang
Liqiang Huang
Qian Huang
Alexander Hübner
Kai Lung Hui
Wendy Hui
Yujong Hwang
Ghiyong Im
Bharat A. Jain
Radhika Jain
Jeevan Jaisingh
Bernard J. Jansen
James J.J. Jiang
Zhenhui (Jack) Jiang
Sung Jin
Alice Johnson
Wen-Sheng Juang
Arnold Kamis
Gerald Kane
Maurits Kaptein
Sabrina Karwatzki
Varol Kayhan
Weiling Ke
Tayfun Keskin
Lara Khansa
Melody Y. Kiang
Dan Kim
Dongmin Kim
Hee-Woong Kim
Jung Seek Kim
Kwansoo Kim
Taeha Kim
Young-Gul Kim
Ruth King
Gary Klein
Ilsang Ko
Cenk Kocas
Chang E. Koh
Joon Koh
Rajiv Kohli
Marios Koufaris
Kevin Kuan
Christoph Kuhn
Ram Kumar
Jason Kuruzovich
Des Laffey
Hsiangchu Lai
Kee-hung (Mike) Lai
Michael Lash
Ulrike Lechner
John Ledyard
Dongwon Lee
Eun-Jung Lee
Ho Geun Lee
Hong Yoo Lee
Inseong Lee
Jungwoo Lee
Myung-Soo Lee
Sang-Yong (Tom) Lee
Yaobin Lee
Chin Laung Lei
Jan Marco Leimeister
Lori Leonard
Dahui Li
Mengxiang Li
Shengli Li
Ting Li
Xin Li
Xinxin Li
Xitong Li
Yung-Ming Li
Huigang Liang
Paul Licker
Annouk Lievens
Chieh-Peng Lin
Fu-ren Lin
Jack Lin
Mei Lin
Yucong Lin
Zhijie Lin
Peng Ling
Charles (Zhechao) Liu
Jun Liu
Xianghua Liu
Ying Liu
Yipeng Liu
Eleanor T. Loiacono
Alexander Lopes
Paul Benjamin Lowry
Xianghua Lu
Yaobin Lu
Stephan Ludwig
Chuan Luo
Christoph Lutz
Xianghua Lv
Mark Lycett
Xiao Ma
Scott McCoy
Pruthikrai Mahatanankoon
Adam M. Mahmood
Rolf Mahnke
Feng Mai
Ronald Maier
Stanislav Mamonov
Kent Marett
Panos Markopoulos
Sarit Markovich
Sean Marston
Nelson Massad
Christian Matt
Uwe Matzat
Kurt Matzler
Jerrold May
Lin Mei
Roberto Mejias
Thomas Miller
Dinesh Mirchandani
Sunil Mithas
Hamid Mohtadi
Alemayehu Molla
Ramiro Montealegre
Greg Moody
Andreas Munzel
Kichan Nam
Guofang Nan
Ravi Nararayanaswamy
Matthew Nelson
Rainer Olbrich
Akinori Ono
Peter Otto
Zafer D. Ozdemir
Zhao Pan
Jun Pang
Insu Park
Sungjune Park
Craig Parker
Bhavik Pathak
Praveen Pathak
Ravi Patnayakuni
David Paul
Kenneth Peffers
Alex Pelaez
Robin Pennington
Christoph Peters
James Pick
Roger A. Pick
Yves Pigneur
Huseyin Polat
Simpson Poon
Jaana Porra
Constance Porter
Key Pousttchi
Chris Preist
Liangfei Qiu
Lingyun Qiu
Elisabetta Raguseo
Vandana Ramachandran
Sridhar Ramaswami
C. Ranganathan
Philipp Rauschnabel
R. Ravichandran
Sury Ravindran
Gautam Ray
Louis Raymond
Hyeun-Suk Rhee
Christoph Riedl
Suzanne Rivard
Lionel P. Robert, Jr.
Ko de Ruyter
Timo Saarinen
Khawaja Saeed
Rajib Saha
Pallab Sanyal
Tobias Schlager
Christian Schlereth
Detlef Schoder
Jochen Scholl
Petra Schubert
Carsten Schultz
Judy Scott
Ravi Sen
Sagnika Sen
Mark Sena
Sanchayan Sengupta
Purvi Shah
Yung-Cheng Shen
Susan A. Sherer
Amit Sheth
Michael (Zhan) Shi
Savannah Shi
Zhan Shi
Hung-Pin Shih
Choon Ling Sia
Michael Siering
Param Vir Singh
Sanjukta Das Smith
Rajib Soha
Jai-Yeol Son
Amy Song
Ryan Sougstad
William Spangler
Martin Spann
Bruce Spencer
Rajendra P. Srivastava
Thomas Stafford Craig Standing
Charles Steinfield
Dennis Steininger
Stefan Stieglitz
Troy J. Strader
Bo-chiuan Su
Chandrasekar Subramaniam
Ashok Subramanian
Eung-Kyo Suh
Daewon Sun
Justin Sydnor
Chuan-Hoo Tan
Daisy (Jing) Tan
Yong Tan
Qian Tang
Xinlin Tang
Monideepa Tarafdar
Alfred Taudes
Orcun Temizkan
Ernie Teo
Thompson Teo
Ferdinand Thies
Ronald Thompson
Simon Thompson
James Y.L. Thong
Daniel Tolstoy
Noam Tractinsky
Arvind Tripathi
Dimitrios Tsekouras
Yanbin Tu
Y. Alex Tung
Ofir Turel
Nicolas Turenne
Tuure Tuunanen
Nathan W. Twyman
Andrew Urbaczewski
Jean-Claude Usunier
Sonja Utz
Rustam Vahidov
Peter van Baalen
Sebastian Voigt
Nir Vulkan
G. R. Wagner
Eric Walden
Zhiping Walter
Alex Wang
Bin Wang
Edward Wang
Eric T.G. Wang
Hui Wang
Kai Wang
Qiu-Hong Wang
Sophia Wang
Weiquan Wang
Sidne Ward
Sunil Wattal
Thomas Weber
K.K. Wei
John D. Wells
Hannes Werthner
Michael Wessel
Rolf T. Wigand
Fons Wijnhoven
Guido Wirtz
Christina Wong
Chuck Wood
Dezhi Wu
Ji Wu
Ping Amy Wu
James Wyse
Lan Xia
Jianhui Xie
Chun-Xiao Xing
Jingjun Xu
Kefeng Xu
Yunjie (Calvin) Xu
Ling Xue
Dong Ling Xu-Priour
Ruiliang Yan
Christopher Yang
Kyunghoon Yang
Zhiyung Yang
Rebecca Yen
Denny Yin
Byungjoon Yoo
Chul Woo Yoo
Yufei Yuan
German Zenetti
Chun Zeng
Cheng Zhang
Dongsong Zhang
Han Zhang
John Zhang
Ping Zhang
Xiaoquan Zhang
Yufei Zhang
Huimin Zhao
Kexin Zhao
Xia Zhao
Haichao Zheng
Xiao-Hui Zheng
Lina Zhou
Wei Zhou
Wenqi Zhou
Yilu Zhou
Zhongyun (Phil) Zhou
Hongwei Zhu
Youlong Zhuang
Vladimir Zwass
Editor-in-Chief