“We wish to enhance the monetary well being of our prospects with options primarily based on know-how and information”

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 in all our aims is to succeed in extra prospects and to take action as effectively as attainable. At the moment, 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 improve its buyer base by 35 p.c and the variety of new prospects has multiplied by 2.5. In reality, in 2016 we added 3.4 million new prospects and we anticipate to achieve 8.3 million in 2021, 3.3 million of which have been by way of our digital channels.

Digitization has clearly performed an important function in our natural shopper progress and can undoubtedly proceed to take action, as mirrored in our gross sales by way of digital channels, which already account for greater than two thirds of the overall.

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 equivalent to SMEs, personal banking, corporations with multi-country footprint, in addition to in cost and insurance coverage merchandise the place, due to our digital transformation, we’re particularly ready to speed up our progress alternative.

Q: Once you speak about third-party channels, do you imply business agreements or embedding your providers in third-party platforms?

A: We imply each. At BBVA we aspire to increase our positioning, reaching the place we beforehand didn’t, both by way of strategic alliances or by way of the combination of providers leveraged on our ‘open banking’ capabilities.

Concerning alliances, some examples embrace the one with Allianz Seguros, by way of which we provide a variety of non-life insurance coverage merchandise, with a particular deal with SMEs and the self-employed, or with Telefónica in Colombia, providing client loans to its prospects. As I stated, these are solely a small instance, since, during the last two years, we’ve elevated our agreements with new companions fivefold.

On the identical time, we additionally wish to obtain a pure integration of our services in third-party platforms, which is able to permit us to succeed in new audiences and markets.  We’re at present including 37 p.c extra prospects by way of third-party channels than in 2019, 10 p.c of the brand new digital prospects. 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 constructing life simpler for their automotive drivers, giving them entry to a debit card linked to their Uber account. On this means, they’ve entry to their earnings instantly from the applying. As well as, by way 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 opportunity 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 possibly can pay in installments if 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 way of the Zolvers platform.

Briefly, these kinds of agreements with third events search to seize prospects the place they work together most often of their every day lives.

“The wants of our prospects drive us to continuously innovate our digital proposal”

Q: Funds is one probably the most precious verticals the place BBVA goes to focus, however this appears to be an space with a number 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 prospects for cost strategies and, with it, a excessive potential for this phase to generate income. Because of this funds will likely 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 12 months and our POS gross sales by 57 p.c.

Our goal is due to this fact to proceed growing new cost options, making the most of a worldwide method. 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 gives omnichannel cost options and value-added providers by way of funds, working underneath a standard infrastructure in Mexico, Colombia, Peru and shortly in Argentina.

And on this demanding and, due to this fact, more and more aggressive surroundings, BBVA has the digital capabilities, channels, information and merchandise that permit us to be extra aggressive and develop our enterprise. We gained market share this 12 months in all our geographical areas. However it’s actually the wants of our prospects 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 prospects, 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’ system. Do you will have any plans on this space?

R: Fee in installments for purchases made in shops is rising exponentially, primarily as a result of robust progress of ecommerce and the emergence of fintechs specialised in these cost strategies (Purchase Now Pay Later).

In Spain, we’re seeing how Purchase Now Pay Later is starting to extend its penetration in e-commerce particularly, estimating that, within the medium time period, it’ll attain ranges much like different northern European international locations (round 15 p.c). Moreover, in Latin American international locations this cost methodology 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 cost 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 present prospects and non-customers. These options require a substantial amount of specialization to have the ability to supply versatile merchandise, with completely digital contracting processes, real-time response and reaching all client sectors.

By the use of instance, in Spain we’ve already launched one of these ‘Purchase now, pay later’ product in massive retailers with which we’ve strategic agreements, equivalent to Inditex and Aliexpress.