GLOBAL BANKING DYNAMICS LEAD TO SUPERIOR DIGITAL MATURITY -- DELOITTE

KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 14 -- The change in the global banking dynamics and increasing need for digitisation across banks have led to superior digital maturity, said Deloitte.

The COVID-19 pandemic impacts had fast-tracked the digital evolution and brought on a number of unique challenges for banks, it said.

“The pandemic saw the need for us to deal with many situations such as social lockdown, remote working, loan defaults, need for interest reductions, and the various small and medium enterprises' (SMEs) stimulus packages,” it said in a statement today.

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Based on Deloitte’s digital maturity assessment, in which more than 250 banks across the world took part, the pandemic saw banks adopting the functionalities such as increasing the limit of contactless payments, Electronic Know your Client (EKYC) solutions, and full digital onboarding experience, it noted.

Similarly in Malaysia, such patterns were also found and adopted, it said.

“Where digital maturity is concerned, it is not about achieving it by offering new products or value added services. It is about having the right balance between innovation, and risk management and security,” said Justin Ong, Malaysia innovation and regulatory leader of Deloitte Malaysia.

He said the key insights on digital bank maturity are the difference in strategies adopted by digital champions versus digital latecomers, and the range of value-added services offered by banks to customers with compelling user-experience.

“Digital champions is an exemplary model in this comparison because they set digital trends and have leading market practices.

“Along the customer journey, champions lead the way especially in expanding relationship, customer onboarding, and mobile as an important channel, with products and personal financial management as the key investment priority,” he noted.

Deloitte Malaysia financial services, risk advisory director, Gopal Kiran, added that with the new digital bank licence that are planned in Malaysia, the competition for digital bank services will be even more intense in the future and the incumbent banks' response will be an interesting space to watch.

-- BERNAMA