Top Trends in Corporate Banking 2014: There Is No Business As Usual

Every year Celent gathers its analysts across the globe to summarize the top trends in retail and wholesale banking for the major geographies.

Over the course of the year, Celent analysts inevitably cover a broader range of topics and trends than they are able to address in their published reports. Some issues get discussed in the Celent Banking blog, and others in private conversations as part of the analyst access available to Celent’s clients.

The issues in this report are not necessarily the most important issues in any given country, or even any given institution. However, collectively, they are a reasonably accurate portrayal of important topics in the developed markets.

“In many ways, 2013 felt like a return to business as usual for corporate bankers and their clients. Economic recovery finally appears to be occurring across the globe (despite some slowdowns in China and emerging markets), and with that comes a renewed focus on how to best leverage technology to foster growth, automate inefficient processes, and make informed decisions,” notes Gareth Lodge, Senior Analyst in Celent’s Banking group and author of this report.

“This isn’t to say that risk and regulation are off the table. In fact, risk and regulation are business as usual for banks in the 21st century,” he adds.

Although risk management and regulation permeate every single one of the trends that we discuss in this report, they are no longer the primary focus when it comes to corporate banks investing in technology. Regulation (actual and anticipated) is playing a larger role than ever in the strategic decisions corporate banks are making about which lines of business to enter, invest in, or exit.

Most of the trends described in this report aren’t new. Some, like advancing corporate client efficiency, have been relevant for decades, but are taking on new urgency given the competitive pressures that banks face from both traditional and nontraditional competitors. Others in this report are more recent trends where, frankly, progress has been slower than anticipated. Corporate banking appears to be making progress at a glacial pace. Despite the conventional wisdom that changes in consumer expectations about technology will create substantial disruption, these changes aren’t moving quite as fast as they are in retail banking. Nevertheless, it would be foolhardy for any corporate banking executive to ignore them.