Banking Strategic Benchmarking Insights 2025 (KPMG Private Enterprise)

Summary

• 83 percent of CEOs surveyed are confident in their company's growth prospects in the next three years, up from 78 percent in 2024.p.2
• Leading banks aim for a 50:30 Value Creation to Value Protection ratio in finance, driven by an integrated data backbone.p.4
• Banks with the 50:30 value index typically have a sourcing ratio between 35 and 45 percent.p.5
• Banks with centralization/offshoring ratios above 50 percent tend to exhibit diminishing value returns.p.5
• The report benchmarks finance, HR, risk, transformation, cost and customer experience functions across banks.p.3

Key insights

1. Retail Banks are aligned to the industry norm on Total Cost of Finance as a percentage of Total OpEx, while Challenger Banks are less efficient.p.4
2. Universal Banks stand out with lower FTE-related expenses but notably higher IT-related costs.p.4
3. Sourcing percentages rose most for financial/statutory reporting, regulatory reporting and internal/management reporting.p.5
4. Leading banks are shifting offshore capabilities from pure accounting operations to data-engineering operations.p.5
5. FTE-related costs form the bulk of total finance costs across the board.p.6