Within the banking or money center banks industry there are a group of firms that offer similar products and services to the same the market. Such as investment banking, online banking, asset manage, and more. The top competitors in the industry are J.P. Morgan Chase, Bank of America Corporation, Barclays PLC, and Citigroup, Inc. J.P. Morgan seems to be at the forefront, boasting of being the leading financial institution worldwide.
It appears that the banking industry is no longer a competitve business but more of an oligopy, meaning the industry is controlled by a small number of firms. Is it a concentrated industry? According to Lynn Parramore, an AlterNet contributing editor, it is. She says the signs that "competition has left building in a given industry" are concentration of power, cost vs. returns, and risk of failures.
There was a massive trend of consolidation in the mid 80's which led to a shrinking of banks in the U.S. Now the biggest banks control a larger share of deposits. Parramore states that there is a huge gap between the cost of goods and services provided by the firms and how much they profit from it. She also says that the bigger banks have become "too big to fail." To read more about the article "Banking Has Become an Oligopoly Instead of a Competitive Business -- And That's Really Bad News for Us 99%," click here:
http://www.alternet.org/economy/152695?page=entire
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