What’s in store for global banking

“Banking around the world may now be passing through a major cyclical correction”

• ... Global banking may be passing through a major cyclical correction at the end of 2007 ... but new McKinsey research suggests that in the longer term the industry’s revenues and profits—poised to continue growing faster than the rate of GDP growth—will double by 2016.


• The historical part of the analysis, which examines global data from 2000 to 2006, reveals a rich mosaic of regional, national, and product diversity. There is little global convergence: different factors seem to drive different markets, which have surprisingly varied structures and uneven growth patterns.


• In 2016, the market capitalization of banks will likely be $12 trillion higher than it is today. As consolidation in the sector accelerates, winners will be able to outmaneuver their competitors by developing a deep, bottom-up understanding of the idiosyncrasies of markets and by understanding the vital importance of being in the right place at the right time.

Introduction ...
With the midsummer credit crunch taking its toll, 2007 turned into a bleak year for the world’s big financial institutions, and 2008 may not be much better. As executives respond to the immediate pressures, however, they should maintain a clear perspective on the long-term outlook, which in our view is considerably brighter. Despite the current correction, we believe that during the next ten years the growth rate of the global banking industry will exceed that of GDP. Driven by powerful basic trends, such as demographics and the math of wealth accumulation, the industry will likely more than double its revenues and profits over the period.

Just as strikingly, McKinsey research also indicates that the industry’s patterns of growth will be diverse and uneven. Our comprehensive analysis of data since 2000 suggests that banking is one of the global economy’s few large industries that isn’t rapidly converging around a single structure or following the same market dynamics everywhere. Indeed, banking’s revenue performance has varied sharply and unexpectedly within regions, countries, subsectors, and product groups—and will continue to do so.

More than in other major industries, it appears, long-term success in banking hangs on being in the right place at the right time. Over the last ten years, for example, 88 percent of the growth in the revenues of Europe’s 20 largest banks was attributable to market momentum—in other words, competing in or entering territories and market segments that enriched everybody. Moreover, timing is critical. Buying into retail-banking markets across Asia in 2000 would have destroyed value over the next four years, as falling stock market multiples more than offset revenue growth. Buying into them in 2004, however, would have been richly rewarding.

In the text and exhibits that follow, we explore the global banking industry’s rich mosaic and highlight some of the core characteristics identified by our research. Our conclusions offer bank strategists and other senior executives a more detailed understanding of the size and composition of different banking markets, as well as insights into future profit trends.

# Big and getting bigger
# Diverse and likely to remain so
# Business mix
# Growth drivers
# Capital market multiples

Full Article: Mckinsey