Finance segments experienced some growth, driven by emerging markets, but the capital markets and commercial banking remained cautious, according to the latest study by the Financial Services Competence Center at Roland Berger Strategy Consultants, "CIB Outlook Summer 2013 – Learning to prosper in a continuously uncertain world".
Roland Berger's analysis, conducted jointly with Nomura bank, identifies a reversal in fixed income (interest and currency, or asset swaps) in the first half of 2013, following good performance in 2012.
For late 2013 and 2014, the consultancy expects to see stabilization of fixed income, a slight recovery in the shares segments and growth in commercial banking, driven by debt capital markets and, to a lesser extent, by the expected recovery of primary shares and mergers & acquisitions.
Learning to flourish in a continuously uncertain world
Against this backdrop, and after years of prosperity and exceptional returns with RoE of >15%, many CIB executives used the crisis to launch cost-cutting initiatives, which have become essential. These initiatives have had a fair amount of impact on operating profit ratios and should be continued.
But the market is still in a state of upheaval, and will not return to its original balance: for example, more and more companies are using shadow banking, regulation is getting stricter (and varies between countries) and players are repositioning themselves in the value chain by outsourcing some of their activities to their former competitors. Thus CIB executives need to be proactive about their future. They must act, despite the gloomy outlook, to boost revenue growth again, particularly through business efficiency/effectiveness measures.
According to the analysis by Roland Berger and Nomura, CIB must especially clarify their positioning and their value proposition in line with four coherent economic models:
The "category killer" modelThe niche product specialist modelThe solution designer/aggregator modelThe trusted advisor model
