From zero to one hundred. This is how Banco Sabadell’s commitment to digitization could be summed up. The entity led by César González-Bueno continues to be committed to advancing the entity’s digital transformation. Especially after trusting her to achieve her profitability targets, ROTE (return on tangible equity) next year. The bank intends to raise it above 10.5%, the level at which it will end this year.
In this, the use of digital channels has been the great challenge of the banking sector for years as a way to attract new customers and save costs. In the case of Banco Sabadell, the bank’s CEO assured that “digital transformation will allow us to increase our customer base and direct business” and little by little this strategy is bearing fruit and more than 50% of new Highs come through that route.
“The objective for the coming months is to increase the linkage of new digital customers, that is, to make them contract more products than the online account or to pay their payroll directly,” he said in the first quarter of the year. The entity also wanted to expand digital registration to other segments and improve the digital capabilities of the app, with a focus on sales functionalities, after a strong recruitment campaign began in the first half of 2022.
In this key strategy has been the launch of the ‘Digital Account’ in the first half of 2022, which entailed no expenses and under its brand, without having to resort to Activo Bank, to try to exceed 200,000 new customers per year, a figure that remained stagnant. From there, and thanks also to the restrictive policy of the European Central Bank (ECB) which has raised interest rates to 4.25% in July this year, the bank has raised the remuneration of its account to 2.5% that it offers since last April and for a maximum remunerable balance of 30,000 euros, one of the highest in the market. In addition, the client could earn an additional 200 euros if they deposited a salary or recurring income of at least 600 euros. Likewise, the bank has evolved its product and now returns 3% of purchases. A policy that has attracted more customers.
More than 55% of new clients, through digital channels
Thus, in ‘individual banking, the acquisition of new customers through digital channels has gone from 0% in 2021 to representing 55% of new hires in the first half of this year, said González-Bueno, during the presentation of results of the bank. And to continue on this path of growth, he has assured that “we must offer more products, but also a digital platform that responds to customers.” In addition, he has recorded that in the first six months of last year new digital customers represent 13%.
And this commitment to digitization has also become the contracting of products through these channels. Digital and remote sales of consumer loans have multiplied by almost 2% from 2021 to 2023, going from 40% to 75%, while in the first six months of 2022 it was 55%. Other products such as cards have also noticed it. The new contracting via digital has gone from 0% in 2021, to representing 20% in 2022, but the great acceleration has been seen this start of the year, with 46%.
Even Banco Sabadell customers make use of digital banking to contract more complex products such as mortgages, where the bank has also entered the mixed-rate credit market since June. In this regard, the new production of loans to purchase housing through specialized managers has gone from representing 0% to 39% in just two years.
