What are the big shifts that have deep implications on Asian banks?

These include the rise of Chinese tech giants, growing migration, and the boom of small businesses.

For Monitor Deloitte partner, co-leader Mohit Mehrotra, the steady rise of China’s tech giants, growing migration, and the boom of small businesses are just some of the big shifts that are shaping how financial institutions can better step up their game to cater to the changing behaviour of technology and consumers.

“If we look at the way enterprises are evolving in the world today, they are shifting away gradually from a command and control environment to an environment which is a lot more geared towards connected capabilities," reported Mehrotra at the Asian Banking and Finance Retail Banking Forum 2018 in Manila. With this, financial institutions should consider the changes in technology and consumers that are creating new needs and concerns.

According to Mehrotra, these are the ten big shifts in Asean with deep implications in financial institutions:

• Rising income inequality
• Old vs new generation of business leaders
• Youth unemployment
• Rise of Chinese internet giants
• Moving to ‘as-a-service’ economy
• ‘time’ constrained workforce
• Growing migration
• Disruption to legacy sectors
• Influence of social media
• Rise of small businesses

In dealing with these shifts, Mehrotra continued to ask banks, “Do we really want to own customer relationships? Can we really own it? Or will the relationships in the future be owned by an ecosystem?”

Mehrotra then went on to reiterate that threats and opportunities lie in the world of ecosystems. He said that banks are left with two strategic choices: build their own ecosystems or participate in them.

Here's more from the Retail Banking Forum 2018 in Manila.