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News and resources on retail banking, consumer finance and reinventing customer experience in finance.

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Expert opinions

Nikunj Gundaniya

Nikunj Gundaniya Product manager at Digipay.guru

Top Neobanking Features Banks Must Offer in 2025

Your customers don’t want to wait anymore. They want all payments to be instant and quick. They just want to tap, pay, and move on. So, if your banking experience feels slow, cluttered, or outdated, they’ll leave. By 2026, over 500 million users are expected to use neobanking platforms worldwide’ says Plaid. And that number is only rising. The me...

/retail

Paul Holt

Paul Holt EMEA Group Vice President at Digicert

DORA Is Here – Why Global Financial Institutions Must Act Now

The Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA) is now very much in play across the EU, setting a new standard for cyber and operational resilience in financial services. While it is a European regulation, its implications are anything but local. Any organisation working with EU-based financial institutions is now part of the DORA conversation, no

/regulation /retail Banking Regulations

Darren Carvalho

Darren Carvalho Co-Founder and Co-CEO at MetaWealth

After Stablecoins, Tokenized Assets Will Be The Next Major Institutional Play in Blockchain

Recent institutional interest in stablecoins has been something of a watershed moment for the crypto industry. Not only has the mainstream adoption of stablecoins signalled a renewed interest in and a broader acceptance of blockchain, but it is the first sign of the convergence of decentralised finance (DeFi) and traditional finance (TradFi). Majo...

/regulation /retail Innovation in Financial Services

Barnabás Birmacher

Barnabás Birmacher CEO and Co-Founder at Bitrise

Cloud, Compliance and UX: Navigating Change in European Banking

The past decade has seen wholesale adoption of cloud infrastructure across the finance industry. This trend has been underpinned by US technology providers, from Microsoft Azure to Oracle and Google Cloud, decreasing their prices as economies of scale in US-based data centres accelerate. And while going cloud native brings benefits to product deve...

/retail /devops Fintech

Shawn Conahan

Shawn Conahan Chief Revenue Officer at Wildfire Systems, Inc.

Marketing: The Most Critical Component of Your Loyalty Rewards Program

The top reason why companies don't achieve significant user adoption of a loyalty rewards program is due to a simple lack of marketing. In general, large banks and corporations are really great at cross-selling "core" banking and finance products, but not so great at conveying the benefits of a rewards program. This is almost certainly ...

/retail Fintech

/retail

Research

Impact Study

Case Management: The key to revolutionising cross-border payments

While the challenges of case management and inefficient E&I processes are not new, the need to address them is more pressing than ever – especially given the G20’s roadmap deadline and the impending global migration to ISO 20022.  In today’s digital era, end-users expect payments to be faster, cheaper and more convenient than ever before – whether domestic or cross-border. As global payment barriers are overcome, banks are tasked not only with meeting customer demands, but business and regulatory ones too.  Enhanced cross-border payments – as supported by the G20’s roadmap and the richer data that ISO 20022 provides – are becoming a real differentiator, with the capability to unlock tremendous value for institutions. However, while a lot of attention is paid to seamless transactions, one area has historically been overlooked: exceptions and investigations (E&I).  This continues to present a significant challenge for both payment providers and corporates, and is impacting numerous networks and technologies. Yet, if harnessed effectively, E&I tools can help institutions significantly reduce costs, speed up processing times, improve transparency and, by extension, satisfy the G20’s targets.  This Finextra impact study, in partnership with Swift, explores:  The advantages of effective E&I processes;  Why solutions are needed to reach the next level; and  How banks can effectively embed them in their infrastructures. 

238 downloads

Impact Study

Reimagining customer journeys: How can banks upscale experience and boost retention?

To stay competitive and better serve their customer base, financial institutions (FIs) must urgently reimagine their customer journeys — from onboarding to the broader lifetime experience — or risk facing a hit to their market share. Technology has significantly transformed the financial services industry, particularly over the last five years. Challenger banks and fintech firms have rapidly gained popularity thanks to their ability to offer fast, simple, digital services. According to data from Plaid, nearly nine out of 10 consumers were using a fintech application in 2023. This percentage will continue to grow.  Financial institutions (FIs) must urgently reimagine their customer journeys or risk facing a hit to their market share. Indeed, today’s customers are more likely than ever to switch primary banking relationships if they do not receive the services they are looking for. Young, digital natives continue to shape this market, with research revealing that 44% of Gen Z customers have changed their primary banking relationship in the last 12 months. The call to competition cannot be ignored.  But how can FIs innovate to meet these demands, while simultaneously running legacy systems? This Finextra impact study, in association with Hyland, explores how financial institutions can:  Reinvent onboarding and Know-Your-Customer (KYC) processes;  Upscale the overall customer journey;  Look to artificial intelligence (AI) for product enhancement and integration; and  Present real-world case studies for each of these objectives. 

240 downloads

Impact Study

NextGen retail banking: A roadmap to successful modernisation

Learn why retail banks must transition to modern, composable, future-ready infrastructures today – and how they can devise journeys that are tailored as well as cost-effective. A significant portion of the retail banking landscape still relies on legacy systems, some of which can be costly and hamper innovation. According to a report from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), 58% of the UK’s financial services firms use legacy infrastructure for some operations, while 33% depend on it for most of their activities. In North America, the picture is similar, with around 40% of US banks still using the Common Business-Oriented Language (COBOL) – a coding language dating back to 1959. Some surveys indicate that up to 70% of bank IT budgets are spent on maintaining these legacy systems.   Today, with rapidly evolving consumer demands, technological advancements, stiff competition, and regulatory upheaval, outdated infrastructures are no longer tenable – and risk negatively impacting banks’ efficiency, agility, and customer experiences. So, how can retail banks modernise, while controlling costs and ensuring minimal impact on day-to-day business applications?   This Finextra impact study, produced in association with Oracle, analyses:  The key challenges of legacy banking systems  How to draw up a tailored roadmap for modernisation  How to quantify progress and measure success 

371 downloads

/retail

FinextraTV

How Rip-And-Replace Alternatives Help to Reimagine Banking

Sitting down with FinextraTV, Keith Redding, CRO, Universal Banking, Finastra discussed what it means to Reimagine Banking and why having the right technology is crucial in this new world.  As well as providing real-world examples, Redding describes how the future is more about progressive transformation than 'rip and replace' and how this approach can help banks turn challenges into opportunities.

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Long reads

Sehrish Alikhan

Sehrish Alikhan Reporter at Finextra

Solving modern KYC challenges

In today’s digital age, banking is expected to be seamless, frictionless, and to make it plain and simple: easy. However, with a constantly shifting regulatory landscape, increased demand for hyper-personalisation and desire to be digital – financial institutions have obstacles to overcome to keep up with consumer demand. A pain point in the digit...

Scott Hamilton

Scott Hamilton Contributing Editor at Finextra Research

Why do customers and business leaders diverge on client experience views?

Customers aren’t ‘buying’ companies’ improved customer experience (CX) claims or promises, and company leaders aren’t buying the value of spending more to delight the customer. At least not in large percentages on either side of the commerce spectrum, according to a recent global study. When it comes to the leaders of the companies surveyed, respo...

Madhvi Sonia

Madhvi Sonia Head of Content at Finextra

The LGBTQ wealth gap: What financial services must do next

April 2025 numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics revealed that the median weekly wage of a typical employee in the United States is $1,001. The Human Rights Campaign analysed this data and found that on average, for LGBTQ+ workers, earnings were around $900 a week. This wage gap equates to LGBTQ+ employees earning 90 cents on the do...