As customer base of FinTechs deepens, competition with banks grows—Agbaje
Contrary to trending experts’ belief that collaborations between commercial banks and financial technology (FinTechs) firms will last forever, the Managing Director of Guaranty Trust Bank Plc, Mr. Segun Agbaje, has shocked pundits, averring that in near future and especially when FinTechs customer base rises, hostile competition may set in.
However, to tame the shocks on the side of Deposit Money Banks in the country, he called on banks to work towards becoming more innovative and creative in generating revenue and business coasts.
In his presentation during the Social Media Week organised by the bank in Lagos, Agbaje argued that “Today; the relationship between banks and FinTechs is collaboration. I think eventually it would become competition. That is because once the FinTechs become big enough and have enough of your customer base, you will become competitors. I think it is collaboration, but it would migrate to competition.”
He said that his mission in the banking industry is to make banking easier and seamless in line with the global rise in digitization.
According to him, “The central aim of GTBank is to build a business model where you create a platform and partner with anybody who has a service to offer, so that if as a customer, you come into our ecosystem, you can just buy anything, you can do your banking business, you can buy your tickets, you can buy insurance, you can travel, if you want to get a 10-day loan, you can come in and do it. So, really, we want you to come into our ecosystem, maybe five times a day to do something more than banking.”
Giving his analogy on the rising fears over spate of digital fraud in banks, Agbaje averred that “the percentage of transactions that are susceptible to fraud is immaterial to the larger level. So, I don’t think people should be scared. We are beginning to build more security around it and I think there are more transactions that are carried out without fraud.”
GTBank had been tracking the yearly observation of Social Media Week in Nigeria.
