Digital banks have multiplied the volume of deposits captured almost by four since 2008, when the financial crisis began, and 2024, going from 20,349 million to 80,329 million, with an acceleration in the last three years.
This is highlighted by the study ‘Artificial intelligence and platformization in Spanish banking: adoption, impact and monitoring of the business model’ published this week by the Savings Bank Foundation (Funcas).
The study dedicates a section to technological competition in which it addresses the situation of neobanks to illustrate their progress. It is based on data from the Spanish Banking Association (AEB) which show the growth of deposits since 2008, more accelerated between 2022 and 2024, a period in which they jumped from almost 60,000 million to 80,000, coinciding with the increases in interest rates, a scenario in which “some digital entities offered more competitive deposit remunerations than traditional banking”according to the study.
In relative terms, of the total deposits of the Spanish banking system, those in the hands of neobanks have gone from representing 3.8% to 9.4%. in the 16 years analyzed.
Furthermore, these entities They managed 11.92% of all bank accounts in Spain in 2018 and in 2024 they already reached 15.55%showing an increase of 3.63 percentage points in six years, as highlighted by Servimedia.
Funcas states that “the current phase of technological competition is characterized by the “neobanks’ attempt to advance from basic transactional products towards the core business of traditional banking” and recognizes that this evolution “poses a strategic challenge different from that faced by traditional banking a decade ago, when competition from digital entities was fundamentally limited to the user experience in operations with lower added value.”
Furthermore, Funcas confirms that the reduction of the branch network in Spain -from 22,299 to 17,109 between 2020 and 2025, according to the Bank of Spain- “has not been accompanied by a proportional reduction in costs per client, which suggests that the partial digitalization of traditional banking is not generating the efficiencies typical of a digital native model.”
Funcas also notes the differences in the users’ rating on Google Play and App Store of several neobank mobile applications. Specifically, it analyzes the ratings of EVO (Bankinter), Imagin (CaixaBank neobank), ING, MyInvestor, N26, Openbank (Santander), Orange Bank (BNP Paribas), Revolut, SelfBank, Trade Republic and WiZink.
As of March 2026, valuations show greater dispersion among digital banks than among traditional banks. Without identifying them, this analysis reflects that Although several digital entities obtain scores of 4.7 or higher out of 5 in both operating systems, one of them is below 2.5 points in both systems, a rating clearly lower than that of any of the top eight banks for which the valuation has also been measured. In traditional banking “the sustained investment effort in technology tends to translate into a relatively homogeneous quality of service among the main entities”, while in purely digital banks “consolidated actors coexist alongside entities that are still in the phase of achieving greater maturation of their product.”
Funcas summarizes that Neobanks “have especially demonstrated their ability to attract customers with simple, transparent and easily comparable products.”such as current accounts, paid payments or deposits” and Their challenge is to move towards products that require a deeper relationship with the client and greater risk management capacity such as mortgages or investment products.
In the case of traditional banking, “the branch network, long-term relationships with clients, experience in risk management, the breadth of products or the strength of the brand continue to be relevant assets, but maintaining them also involves costs”. His challenge is “to ensure that these capabilities complement the digital channel and do not become a source of rigidity compared to lighter competitors”, although he points out that if digitalization “is not accompanied by a transformation of internal processes, technological systems and the organization, an expensive hybrid structure can be consolidated” with less physical presence and still too complex to achieve the efficiencies of digital banks.
Source: www.expansion.com
