the underside of its dazzling growth in the 3rd quarter

The second French bank to publish its results for the third quarter of 2022, Société Générale can count on Boursorama Banque to give itself bright prospects in retail banking. As of September 30, 2022, online banking had 4.3 million customers, up 40% year-on-year. On the same date last year, Boursorama had 3.1 million customers. At this stage, with 1.2 million more French people in its accounts, it retains a spectacular lead over the competition. Hello bank!, BNP Paribas’ online bank, has less than one million customers.

The investment pays. External growth too. As a reminder, Boursorama Banque bought some of the accounts of ING France customers. It has thus recovered 315,000 customers at present – ​​mainly high net worth customers, whereas these were customers with life insurance contracts – representing a migration rate of 63%. In its results for the quarter, Societe Generale says that account transfers have returned to two-thirds of their progress. For ING customers who had a current account, opening a Boursorama Banque account is not compulsory, but an agreement between the two banks resulted in an attractive offer (320 euros premium).

Retail banking is now Boursorama

Boursorama Banque is not yet talking about profitability. It will happen later. “In the discussion of the future strategy, we continue to say that we want to be profitable by 2024-2025”, announced to us the general manager of Boursorama Banque, Benoit Grisoni, in an interview at the beginning of July. But a rather symbolic observation emerges from the results of the banking group based in La Défense in Paris: in the third quarter, the retail bank of Societe Generale saw its profits fall by 6%. The fault with the remuneration of the regulated booklets and with the provisions made up in the event of unpaid. But it is also a sign that for Société Générale and Crédit du Nord, which are due to merge next year, the traditional bank account is no longer a priority in the face of online banking.

© Societe Generale

During our last interview, Benoit Grisoni also stated that one out of two Boursorama customers made their account a main account, to domicile their income, make direct debits there, and settle day-to-day transactions using the various free bank cards. offered by the institution. Societe Generale’s third quarter results drive the point home and show that average outstanding deposits increased by 37% over one year, from 35 to 46 billion euros. Financial savings still representing a substantial part, it is nothing compared to deposits which are still increasing. Outstanding loans also rose by 21%.

Nothing stops online banking

Faced with the 6% drop in profits of Societe Generale’s retail banking, Boursorama reveals another impressive figure: 365,000. This is the number of account openings carried out over the three months of the period, i.e. 2.2 times more than in the third quarter of last year, when already 163,000 people opened an account. Boursorama takes off, and nothing seems to stop it. The resumption of welcome bonuses has helped sustain this pace, whereas today it is very advantageous to open a Boursorama account to receive a bonus, especially during Pink Weekend.

Let’s not forget that these figures refer to the three months preceding September 30. Société Générale will still publish its fourth quarter results to conclude the year 2022 and we should be able to discover a surprise with Boursorama Banque, which will already be approaching 5 million customers. The milestone should be crossed in January or February 2023, unless a new attractive offer comes out, or if an external growth operation begins. The project is not impossible: Orange Bank is in difficulty and its portfolio of 1.7 million customers in France (a figure inflated by the presence of customers with a mobile insurance offer) could be redeemed.