Classification of banks in the Turkish banking sector by clustering analysis during the COVID-19 pandemic period

Covid-19 pandemic declaration by the World Health Organization on March 11, 2020 has been done. To reduce the risk of transmission of the Covid-19 pandemic, states have taken measures to minimize their mobility. With a decrease in human mobility in many sectors of the economy, companies have closed down by experiencing a crisis. Pandemic support measures have been put into operation by the economic management through the banking sector in order to provide the funding sources needed by companies and consumers. Non-repayable support loans, 1-year postponed housing loans, new and second-hand vehicle loans, social life support consumer loans, holiday loans for the tourism sector and KGF-supported commercial loans were made available by state-owned deposit banks Ziraat Bank, Halk Bank and Vakıflar Bank. It is predicted that the breakthroughs made by these three public banks in order to keep the market alive compared to other banks bring about differentiation among banks in the sector. In this study, by applying hierarchical clustering analysis and non-hierarchical (k-means) clustering analysis with 21 banks and 24 variables in 2019, 2020 and 2021, it was investigated whether public deposit banks were differentiated from private and foreign capital deposit banks. According to the hierarchical cluster analysis, the Covid-19 pandemic did not make a significant difference in the clusters of banks. According to the non-hierarchical cluster analysis, significant clusters were realized. Keywords: Covid-19 pandemic, Cluster analysis, Turkish banking sector