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Your quick guide to the week ending February 3, 2023 on TheBanker.com.
The industry plans for the launch of a digital euro, and The Banker unveils the top 500 most valuable bank brands at the start of February. Editor Joy Macknight discusses how banks can build brand value, while Laura Murray of HSBC lends her thoughts on the Electronic Trade Documents Bill and law firm Peters & Peters offers analysis of the anti-fraud duty Quincecare. Our global coverage brings you insights from Panama and Peru.
Trending topics
- Top 500 Banking Brands 2023 – Joy Macknight outlines | Click here to read
The Banker/Brand Finance’s Top 500 Banking Brands ranking has seen another year of global brand value expansion. The aggregate value in the 2023 edition has increased for a second year in a row, to reach the highest-ever total of $1.41tn. However, it is a much smaller rise of 2.4%, compared to the 8.7% increase in 2022.
One of the main contributors to this lacklustre result is China’s 3.5% contraction in aggregate brand value, to $423.4bn. While the heady days of double-digit growth are well behind it, this is the first time that China has failed to register an increase since it overtook the US as the global brand powerhouse in 2017. Of the 52 Chinese banks in the ranking (one more than last year), a little over half (56%) saw an increase in their brand value.
- Digital euro could be in circulation by 2027, ECB tells bank forum – Anita Hawser reports | Click here to read
Lee Braine, managing director in the chief technology office at Barclays, concedes CBDCs could be highly disruptive and have commercial implications. One such impact is the potential for retail CBDCs to divert customer deposits from commercial banks to central banks.
“The main financing source for banks in Europe is customer deposits,” Mr Schaaf explained. “If we design a digital euro that is too attractive, the risk is that it will move money from the balance sheets of commercial banks to the ECB. We are convinced that we can address that with a threshold on private holdings of the digital euro or by disincentivising remuneration for a CBDC, or a combination of both, so the private sector is more attractive.”
Opinion sharers
- Building brand value: what makes a strong banking brand? – Joy Macknight investigates | Click here to read
In order to build trust, a bank must be transparent, according to Cristina Junqueira, co-founder of Nubank, a Brazilian neobank that jumped up the ranking this year. “At Nubank, we believe that a strong banking brand has a transparent relationship with its customers, taking seriously the commitment to daily exceed expectations and build long-term trust,” she says.
Ms Junqueira adds: “We grant people more autonomy and control over their finances via an easy-to-use, fully digital multi-product platform that is built to fit their different financial needs, through a brand that is transparent and human that helps them achieve their financial goals.”
- Electronic Trade Documents Bill to bring global trade into the 21st century – Laura Murray comments | Click here to read
Why does this matter? In a digitally led world of ChatGPT, Uber and Amazon, it is almost impossible to imagine a paper-based system where around 28.5 billion trade documents, including bills of lading and bills of exchange, are physically printed and flown around the world daily, because electronic forms of trade documentation can’t currently be used in the same way as their paper equivalents.
To retrieve traded goods, one must physically visit ports with paper documentation in hand – highlighting how a 21st century UK is having to comply with 19th century legislation. Without this vital change, trade will continue to be paper-based, costly, complex and time-consuming, according to Laura Murray, interim head of global trade and receivables finance at HSBC UK.
- The Quincecare duty: 35 years on, the debate has only just begun – Paul Johnson and David Fitzpatrick comment | Click here to read
The Quincecare duty, named after the case in which it was established, requires financial institutions to refrain from executing customers’ orders if they are put on notice that the orders are part of a fraud. The last few years have brought a flurry of disputes over the duty to the country’s highest courts.
Quincecare has long been contentious, not least because of the obvious challenge it presents to financial institutions when considered alongside their duty to comply promptly with their customers’ instructions so as to avoid causing them financial loss.
The anti-fraud duty has gained recent prominence as upcoming legal challenges threaten to increase banks’ responsibilities in the context of increasingly sophisticated fraud. Analysis by Paul Johnson and David Fitzpatrick of law firm Peters & Peters.
Globe at a glance
- Panama’s banks at a crossroads – Barbara Pianese reports | Click here to read
- Peru’s banking system to grow says finance minister – Barbara Pianese reports | Click here to read
