Savings banks – mergers

Savings bank mergers open doors to new opportunities and greater resilience in challenging times.

Key challenges in the savings bank landscape

The savings bank landscape is experiencing fairly challenging times. These include the far-reaching changes in the interest rate environment, driven by rising inflation rates, the looming recession and demographic trends, which lead to an increasing shortage of staff and skills.

In response to this situation, consolidation efforts are intensifying. Mergers are seen as a strategically important option for successfully mastering these challenges and making the most of any opportunities that arise.

Uncertain market environment

Geopolitical tensions are exerting pressure on the overall economy, high inflation rates have changed the interest rate landscape, which in turn has an impact on savings banks’ profit margins, and digital ecosystems and platforms are dynamically changing customer behavior.

Shortage of skilled workers

The shortage of skilled workers is being accelerated by demographic trends and is turning into a “battle for each talent”. In addition, the banker’s profession has become less attractive. This shortage is limiting potential growth.

Sustainability

Environmental protection is strongly gaining in importance due to climate change. Accordingly, the green transformation of the economy and society is triggering a massive need for investment. A lack of size or skills poses the risk of not participating in the transformation.

Regulatory requirements

Regulatory requirements have increased significantly in recent years and there is still no end in sight. Additional capital requirements are enforced through Basel IV and the regulations applicable since 2023. As a result, almost all savings banks are defining additional capital buffers that exceed the requirements.

In the light of these challenging circumstances, many savings banks are feeling impelled to make consolidation efforts.

Mergers are increasingly being considered as a sensible strategic measure.

Benefits that mergers can produce for savings banks

Growth in company size can significantly strengthen resilience to external uncontrollable market influences.

It makes it possible to fill key positions and become more attractive to talents. It can also help to manage the massive financing requirements that come along with the green transformation.

At the same time, staff members can be qualified to handle the constantly increasing regulatory requirements, especially in terms of capital.

For these reasons, all strategic options, including possible mergers, should be carefully considered.

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How zeb can support your merger

Merger processes are complex and require numerous decisions to be made in a short space of time. zeb is the undisputed market leader for savings bank mergers and has extensive expertise in all sectors, size classes and merger phases. In recent years, we have supported more than 50 mergers in the savings bank sector .
Based on this wide merger experience, our experts accompany the entire merger process and ensure adequate, tailored support in every phase:

Exploration: mutual transparency and common solution spaces for political cornerstones
Initiation: preparation of a strategy and management concept#
Day-1 readiness: compliance with regulatory requirements
Integration: organizational and cultural merger implementation and derivation of merger benefits

With our in-house developed zeb design process, we actively address the issue of cultural integration, which is a key challenge of a merger. To this end, we combine necessary technical topics as part of a merger with cultural/integrative components and enhance them with broad participation formats that encourage dialog and the joint further development of the merged company.

Mergers continue to be a relevant strategic option to jointly shape the future. A clear process model in all stages of the merger is the key to sustained economic success.

Andreas Polensky, Senior Manager