Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of the thesis is to investigate what gender diversity in boardrooms brings for sort of effect on financial performance regarding the chosen variables return on equity, return on assets, gender diversity, bank size, board size and independence.

Research design – The study was conducted using a quantitative research strategy with a deductive nature. Secondary data were being used for the statistical tests and it was gathered from the bank’s annual reports directly from each bank’s website. All data were being coded and sorted using Excel and later entered in IBM SPSS Statistics Viewer.

Findings – Evidence from the multivariate analysis test show that both gender diversity and bank size have a negative effect on banks financial performance. However, the more independent board members a bank have the better financial results it shows. There are also findings that show that the size of the bank boards have no effect at all on the financial performance. 

Contribution – This study contributes to the knowledge about how women being on the board of directors negatively affect the performance of Swedish commercial banks. The study also contributes to what type of variables affecting the performance in the form of direction and strength.

Value - The result of this study could serve as an instrument for Swedish commercial banks, females and the society as a whole to decide how they will move forward with the voluntary standards that have been promoted by the Swedish Corporate Governance Board.