Where Does Accounting Information Create Value? A Three-Perspective Balanced Scorecard Analysis of Digital–Financial Capabilities in SMEs

Studies of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) often report that accounting information system (AIS) quality has no direct effect on performance, possibly because performance is aggregated into a single construct. This study disaggregates SME performance into three balanced scorecard (BSC) perspectives (learning and growth, internal business processes and financial performance) and examines where AIS quality, FinTech innovation and financial literacy are associated with this partial BSC chain. Survey data from 165 SMEs in Bekasi, Indonesia, were analysed with covariance-based structural equation modelling, bias-corrected bootstrapping and five competing models, supplemented by item-level, alternative-parcel, ordinal, common-method and estimator sensitivity analyses. The perspectives are strongly associated in a pattern consistent with the BSC ordering: learning and growth relates to financial performance only through internal processes (full simple mediation, β = 0.335). Model comparisons, however, cannot establish causal direction, because a reverse chain fits better than the hypothesised chain and the aggregate model has the lowest BIC. The hypothesised point-specific entry pattern is rejected. FinTech innovation is most strongly associated with learning and growth, and its total association with financial performance (β = 0.553) runs mainly through the chain. AIS quality has no significant unique association with any perspective; exploratory analysis indicates that its association with financial performance runs through FinTech innovation and financial literacy. Accounting information thus appears to be linked to SME performance through digital and financial capabilities, a pattern that longitudinal research should test causally.