McKinsey Global Banking Annual Review: Banking on a Sustainable Path

McKinsey has released its yearly state of the industry report providing an in-depth look at banking in today’s volatile environment and its future prospects.

This year marked the biggest shift in global banking for over a decade, providing banks with both the opportunity (from higher margins and the fintech correction) and the need (as a result of macroeconomic volatility and growing sector divergence) to master a dual challenge: maintain resilience in the short term while accelerating the transformation into a future-proof, sustainable value creation model.

The divergence in performance between leading banks and the rest continues to grow. Despite higher margins from rising interest rates and a stronger capital position, more than half of the world’s banks continue to struggle with profitability and have a return on equity that is below their cost of capital. But all banks can focus now on improving their short-term resilience and preparing for longer-term opportunities. The report examines strategies that have allowed some players to rise above the fray and outperform.

Among the opportunities is sustainable finance, which is on the cusp of a “next era” as banks finance not just clean energy but a broad array of transformational low-carbon projects across industry sectors. Debt-focused investment supporting the transition to net zero alone could represent revenue potential for banks of at least $100 billion annually by 2030.

What this means for African Banks

In line with banks globally, African banks have experienced a strong recovery in profitability, with average ROEs up from 12% in 2020 to 15% forecast for 2022. This could mean relatively stable ROEs for African banks over the next 5 years despite global macroeconomic shocks. But there is also significant variance across the continent, with banks in Nigeria and Kenya, in particular, trading at price-to-book ratios well below 1, Morocco trading over 1, and South Africa well over 2 on average (amongst the highest in the world).

“This boost in profitability gives African institutions the breathing room to improve their short-term resilience as we face the global challenges of continued geopolitical shocks. It also gives them the opportunity to continue investing in technology to enable growth,” says Francois Jurd de Girancourt, a partner in McKinsey’s Casablanca office, and leader of the firm’s Financial Institutions Group in Africa.

Africa could be one of the fastest growing regions for banking revenue globally (6-7% in local currency terms) in 2022—led by North Africa (9%) and West Africa (7%) with a revenue pool of ~$100bn. The picture is lower but remains positive if currency depreciation is taken into account. This growth is underpinned by deepening penetration of banking services and rising interest rates adding to opportunities in payments and transactional banking and is aided by the ongoing explosion of fintech activity across the continent.

“In Nigeria, agile and innovative startups are taking advantage of increased technology penetration and high levels of unmet needs in the traditional banking sector to seize market share. A youthful population, increasing smartphone penetration, and a focused regulatory drive to increase financial inclusion and cashless payments are all contributing to this shift,” says Edem Seshie, an associate partner, in McKinsey’s Lagos office.

Much like the rest of Africa and the world, sustainable finance in Nigeria is also entering the ‘next era’—shifting from a focus on renewables to a broader set of deployment across the energy transition. 

Africa’s efforts to navigate the energy transition and adapt to climate change are likely to be supported by investor demand for sustainability-linked bonds, which have grown from 2% of bonds in 2017 to ~8% in 2022 (>$1.7bn of sustainability-linked bonds issued).

To fully take off, climate finance will require clearer definitions and better metrics. There are a number of opportunities across CIB, commercial and small-business banking, retail banking, and wealth and asset management. Examples of business building are emerging across geographies as banks recognize the capital need required to support the transition and the role the industry plays.