It strikes me that there’s a lot of common sense, there. Retail banking has gradually been dying, since the “crash” anyway, really, hasn’t it?
Retail and investment banking have gradually becoming a bit more separated, in many countries, too, I think? And retail banking in its current form, in itself, probably isn’t really a financially viable business, in the long term, anyway?
“It’s banking, Jim, but not as we know it.”
(I think there’s probably quite a bit of common sense in the article following it, about wearing low-cut blouses, too, but that’s perhaps less relevant in this context …).
I cannot see that… what is it about?
I agree, retail banking has been transferring to electronic banking, so personnel will be laid off…
I work in one of those large financial institutions but not in the retail banking side of things. The shift to identifying ourselves as a tech company has been underway for a few years now. Senior managers here have said repeatedly how they see us now as one of the largest tech companies in Ireland as opposed to one of the largest financial companies. They see us as a tech company that provides a range of financial services. Everything we do is geared towards increasing automation & STP and lowering FTE. Technology is obviously the key enabler this.
Not surprised that retail banking which is basically very simple for the most part is going the way of the dodo. All those types of jobs across all sectors of the economy are for the headman’s axe over the coming decade. Going to make for some interesting employment challenges.
Ooh, there’s a different article below it, now. On my screen, anyway. (I don’t understand “linkedin” at all). When I originally read the one you linked to, the next article after it on the same page was saying that at job interviews, there’s still some overall prejudice in favour of women who dress slightly more adventurously, and commenting on it. (I’ve never actually been to a job interview but would naturally expect my shoes to get me the job :8: ).
Yes, small retail banking branches are closing and/or becoming glorified cashpoints as “sub-branches”, aren’t they? It’s bound to cause job losses? It’s probably done mostly in order to reduce staff salary costs?
Very interesting point as always Pip, retail banking is definitely having some ups and downs. I can see staff being replaced by machines as is happening now in some Barclays branches, this is likely to continue and eventually, it will go online.
There is bigger change threatening banking and that is one of the crypto world, as in Bitcoin and other smart contracts, that also threatens the brokerage space. There are governments with the exception of the US that continue to fund Crypto, the jump in Bitcoin, is evidence of its adopt-ability, in fact a few years ago we all thought it was a waste of time as banking pundits tried to kill it. Now smart contracts are closer to a reality, we are seen robinhood and other peer to peer type apps all over the financial space. So a wider change is happening in finance. Goldman Sachs and a few other major banks are still holding a lot of patents and are no doubt planning their next move.
Nice point on retail banking.
Thank you for that detailed answer, Tektolnes… Great post…
Thank you, Dr. Lexy! Like during the automation of agricultural industries in the age of the industrial revolution, it is as hard now as it was then to imagine what the future would look like without that human element that came to be part of certain jobs: farming, milking, sewing, carding, carpenting, wheelwrighting, candlemaking, and so on… nowadays, it would post(wo)men, hauliers, bank branch staff, and so on… The issue is that we feel the loss in an age of change, as the ‘traditional’ jobs of tomorrow have yet to be discovered, so we only see the loss and not the gain. Inevitably, like in the ‘death of the working (wo)man’ seen in traditionally industrial jobs like automotive and steel, entire communities will fall out of favour with profitmakers, consumers, and eventually will be left behind: this is the ugly side of capitalism, as seen in scores of carmaking and mining towns all around Europe and the USA, and currently being also witnessed here in the north of Scotland with the demise of half a century of crude oil boom…
We are in the hands of change, and we can not always be part of that change, so it is obviously a difficult time where entire swathes of working population will be left jobless, broke, and replaced by robots.
Roboethics is a booming sector, academically and technologically, because the machines of tomorrow will mingle ever more closely with us, not just as single-use tools (the toaster, the telephone, the television, the electric toothbrush) but as complex robotic organisms that will service/repair themselves and have ever greater sophistication in terms of neural pathways for incremental learning. Artificial Intelligence will compute faster than humans, and repetitive tasks done by humans (e.g. answering calls, processing accounts, etc.) will move from the human+machine combination to an entirely machine-based one…
This is what is in front of us, scary as it may seem, except it will not affect just a sector of the population (e.g. women, men, ethnic minorities, young people, the elderly) but everyone, across
the spectrum… Anti-robot or ‘cyborgbashing’ will probably become the thing behind which people will unite when resisting change, like the Luddites did centuries ago when breaking the machines that wanted to usurp their jobs…
A complex world of change is ahead.
Thanks Emerald!
Good to see you back!
I guess you are right: the demise of fiat currencies; the introduction of negative incentives for holding or withdrawing cash deposits; the move to the internet of things; the change from signed credit card transactions to pin-based ones and now to contactless/swipe ones points to biotechnologies with DNA-based ‘signing’ of transactions, by which databases will be in the hands of corporations, who will use it to tailor advertising and services (much like Facebook, Google, and others are currently doing through data-sharing).
The question is: for retail forex traders, how will this evolve? Will brokers adapt or be forced out of business?