Fintech Adoption and Firm Performance: Mechanisms, Contingencies, and the Limits of Current Evidence

Financial technology is frequently presented as a general-purpose route to improved firm performance, but the evidence is more conditional than that proposition implies. This narrative review synthesizes work on fintech use by non-financial firms and financial institutions, separating payments, digital financial access, and platform-based financing from the performance of fintech vendors themselves. The literature develops from early studies of interorganizational financial infrastructure toward firm-level analyses of digital payments, SME finance, and technology-enabled resource allocation. Yet performance gains are not uniform: adopters may incur implementation costs before returns materialize; digital finance can substitute for conventional lending or intensify competitive pressure; and the value of use depends on firm capabilities, institutional infrastructure, and the specific technology deployed. Evidence is strongest where firm-level panels, long adoption histories, or quasi-experimental variation are available, but much of the SME literature remains cross-sectional and self-reported.