Post-growth and stakeholder value distribution: A compositional analysis of the Spanish financial system

Abstract

Purpose: This article analyses how value is distributed among stakeholders in the Spanish financial system from a post-growth perspective. It focuses not only on how much value is created, but on how it is allocated across main stakeholders, in order to assess financial institutions by their distributive orientation and its alignment with broader wellbeing goals.

Design/methodology/approach: The article adopts a quantitative compositional approach to stakeholder value shares expressed as percentages that sum to 100%. To compare these “closed” data without distortion, it uses Aitchison’s distance, which is designed for compositional vectors and avoids the biases produced by the constant-sum constraint. The analysis estimates how far each institution’s distributive profile departs from the sectoral centre and then orders these distances to identify dominant orientations. On this basis, the article proposes a five-type classification of distributive profiles: social, legacy, extractive, neutral, and detractive, enabling systematic comparisons across different institutional forms within the Spanish financial system.

Findings: The analysis identifies clear differences in stakeholder value distribution across institutions, indicating structured heterogeneity rather than random variation. The proposed five-type typology captures distinct distributive orientations: some profiles prioritise value allocation to labour and the public sector, others concentrate value toward investors, while neutral and detractive profiles reflect more balanced or weaker/negative distributive contributions. Overall, the results show that institutional diversity in Spanish finance is reflected not only in business models and governance, but also in the relative structure of stakeholder value allocation.

Originality/value:Using distribution alongside profit changes how financial performance is understood. Profit shows how much value is retained, but not who benefits from it. A distributive approach based on Aitchison distance helps researchers, regulators, and managers assess how value is shared among stakeholders, and it can also help policy makers design rules based not only on profit, but on distribution. From a post-growth perspective, this matter because improving collective wellbeing depends not only on creating value, but also on how that value is allocated.