Q: BBVA has set formidable progress targets for 2024, what function does digitization play in attaining them?
A: BBVA’s aims proceed to be very formidable and are primarily based on the technique we set a few years in the past. One among our aims is to succeed in extra clients and to take action as effectively as attainable. At present, scale is a aggressive benefit for the banking enterprise, one thing that, added to our digital capabilities, is permitting us to extend our buyer base considerably.
Over the previous 5 years, BBVA has been in a position to enhance its buyer base by 35 p.c and the variety of new clients has multiplied by 2.5. The truth is, in 2016 we added 3.4 million new clients and we anticipate to realize 8.3 million in 2021, 3.3 million of which have been by means of our digital channels.
Digitization has clearly performed a vital function in our natural consumer progress and can undoubtedly proceed to take action, as mirrored in our gross sales by means of digital channels, which already account for greater than two thirds of the full.
Our goal is, on the one hand, to proceed to develop each in our personal channels and people of third events, and on the opposite, in high-value verticals similar to SMEs, personal banking, corporations with multi-country footprint, in addition to in fee and insurance coverage merchandise the place, because of our digital transformation, we’re particularly ready to speed up our progress alternative.
Q: Once you speak about third-party channels, do you imply industrial agreements or embedding your providers in third-party platforms?
A: We imply each. At BBVA we aspire to broaden our positioning, reaching the place we beforehand didn’t, both by means of strategic alliances or by means of the combination of providers leveraged on our ‘open banking’ capabilities.
Concerning alliances, some examples embody the one with Allianz Seguros, by means of which we provide a spread of non-life insurance coverage merchandise, with a particular give attention to SMEs and the self-employed, or with Telefónica in Colombia, providing client loans to its clients. As I mentioned, these are solely a small instance, since, during the last two years, we have now elevated our agreements with new companions fivefold.
On the similar time, we additionally wish to obtain a pure integration of our services and products in third-party platforms, which is able to enable us to succeed in new audiences and markets. We’re at the moment including 37 p.c extra clients by means of third-party channels than in 2019, 10 p.c of the brand new digital clients. So in view of this information, our dedication to alliances takes on particular significance.
Q: Has the settlement with Uber began to yield outcomes? Are you able to touch upon some other agreements?
A: This partnership arose with the concept of creating life simpler for their automobile drivers, giving them entry to a debit card linked to their Uber account. On this manner, they’ve entry to their revenue immediately from the appliance. As well as, by means of the moment funds performance, they obtain the funds equivalent to the rides they make instantly with out having to attend for Uber to switch the stability to their financial institution accounts.
This implies new customers for BBVA and the potential of increasing related options to different companions and in different geographical areas.
With regard to different varieties of agreements, we’re providing our companions loans, funds or insurance coverage merchandise at time of buying, making them actually contextual. For instance, in Spain, you may pay in installments while you purchase on AliExpress.
With different companions, we’re reaching new segments. That is the case for younger individuals in Spain, who discover the BBVA App pre-installed in Xiaomi smartphones, or cleaners or housekeepers in Mexico who can open accounts with BBVA by means of the Zolvers platform.
Briefly, all these agreements with third events search to seize clients the place they work together most continuously of their every day lives.
“The wants of our clients pressure us to continuously innovate our digital proposal”
Q: Funds is one probably the most invaluable verticals the place BBVA goes to focus, however this appears to be an space with a whole lot of competitors and new gamers…
A: Certainly, over the previous few years, the robust acceleration of digitization has led to an ever-increasing demand from our clients for fee strategies and, with it, a excessive potential for this section to generate income. For this reason funds can be one of many key progress areas for BBVA. A lot in order that our card gross sales have grown by 51 p.c this yr and our POS gross sales by 57 p.c.
Our goal is due to this fact to proceed creating new fee options, benefiting from a worldwide method. A very good instance is Aqua, a card with a clearly differentiated worth proposition that already operates efficiently in Spain, Mexico, Colombia and Turkey. And Openpay, a ‘one-stop-shop’ for retailers, which presents omnichannel fee options and value-added providers by means of funds, working underneath a typical infrastructure in Mexico, Colombia, Peru and shortly in Argentina.
And on this demanding and, due to this fact, more and more aggressive setting, BBVA has the digital capabilities, channels, information and merchandise that enable us to be extra aggressive and develop our enterprise. We gained market share this yr in all our geographical areas. However it’s actually the wants of our clients and, the truth is, this competitors, which is pushing us to continuously innovate our digital proposal.
It also needs to be famous that the world of funds is a world of collaboration and open innovation, which permits us to method different ecosystems with which we’re keen to collaborate and embed our providers to succeed in extra clients, so it’s attainable that, sooner or later, we’ll see extra agreements and collaborations.
Q: What’s your opinion on the success of the ‘purchase now, pay later’ components. Do you have got any plans on this space?
R: Fee in installments for purchases made in shops is rising exponentially, primarily because of the robust progress of ecommerce and the emergence of fintechs specialised in these fee strategies (Purchase Now Pay Later).
In Spain, we’re seeing how Purchase Now Pay Later is starting to extend its penetration in e-commerce specifically, estimating that, within the medium time period, it can attain ranges much like different northern European international locations (round 15 p.c). Moreover, in Latin American international locations this fee technique is in a way more preliminary stage, so we anticipate its penetration to develop progressively within the coming years.
BBVA’s purpose is to be a number one financial institution on this enterprise, leveraging our expertise in client finance and fee strategies. To this finish, we’re working globally on the event of inner options which might be built-in into retailers and that allow the financing of purchases in installments, each for current clients and non-customers. These options require quite a lot of specialization to have the ability to provide versatile merchandise, with solely digital contracting processes, real-time response and reaching all client sectors.
By means of instance, in Spain we have now already launched this sort of ‘Purchase now, pay later’ product in giant retailers with which we have now strategic agreements, similar to Inditex and Aliexpress.
