Financial Services

The financial services sector has enjoyed several years of strong returns but is facing intensifying pressures from a new breed of shareholders, rising regulatory costs and increasingly demanding customers. At the same time, given the maturity of the market, the inherent growth is limited making the search for greater returns even more difficult.

 Responses to this complex and challenging environment will vary. The cost-based acquisition approach fuelled by deregulation and globalisation will continue, although success depends on realising critical merger synergies. Organic growth strategies are equally testing requiring the development of competitive value propositions, innovative products and smart channel management.

Ensuring that cost growth does not outstrip revenue growth is a relentless challenge. Financial institutions grapple with how to satisfy front office demands without adding cost and complexity to the back office, with the constant need for technology investment, and with how to ensure that the right organisational structure is in place to serve different customer segments and geographic markets.

How We Help Our Clients

• Booz & Company helps clients in all areas of financial services - from banking, capital markets, exchanges, credit cards, insurance and others - to develop winning strategies. Our industry teams partner with our specialist colleagues in operations and IT, bringing deep functional expertise to our clients. 
• We help clients develop top-line revenue strategies. In retail banking, this includes developing strategies to harness the potential from the branch network. In wholesale banking, where product commoditisation is squeezing margins, we can help develop sophisticated risk assessment techniques and smarter segmentation strategies. In capital markets, where traditional roles are shifting, we help clients decide where to play in the value chain. 
• We can also help organisations develop sustainable cost reduction programmes. We have rich experience in helping clients tackle costs by creating effective shared services structures, developing outsourcing and offshoring strategies and harnessing the value of IT.