Survey Of World's Top 500 Bank Brands Shows Growth In Banking Brands From Middle East

Jan. 31, 2010 - PRLog -- BRANDFINANCE® GLOBAL BANKING 500 SHOWS:

•       HSBC WORLD’S LEADING BANK BRAND FOR 3RD YEAR IN A ROW

•       SANTANDER IS WORLD’S FASTEST GROWING RETAIL BANK BRAND

•       DECLINE IN US DOMINANCE OF WORLD BANKING INDUSTRY

•       RISE IN BANKING BRANDS FROM MIDDLE EAST

•       FIRST RUSSIAN BANK BREAKS INTO WORLD TOP 20 BANK BRANDS

The banking sector has begun to show tangible signs of recovery, with the world’s 500 most valuable banking groups growing by 62% in terms of market capitalisation and their brand values cumulatively increasing by 49%, according to the fourth edition of the BrandFinance® Global Banking 500 – an annual review of the top banking brands in the world.

The report, which measures companies by both brand strength and brand value as of 31st December 2009, details how all segments of the banking industry have recovered.

HSBC retains its place as the most valuable banking brand in the world for the third year in a row, increasing in brand value by 12% to US$28.5bn. Bank of America, the second most valuable global banking brand increased in brand value by 24% to US$26.1bn. However, smaller US brands showed much higher percentage increases than Bank of America including Goldman Sachs, Chase and JP Morgan (106%, 53% and 45% respectively).

Santander is the world’s fastest growing retail bank brand, coming third overall in the Top 500. The Spanish banking group saw its brand value rise by US$14.8bn, an increase of 136% to US$25.6bn. A significant factor in the growth in Santander’s brand value has been the consolidation of Abbey, Alliance & Leicester and Bradford & Bingley brands under the Santander brand.

The BrandFinance® Global Banking 500 rankings also track the rise of banking brands from emerging markets.  Middle Eastern brands, and most particularly in the GCC states, revealed a strong performance increasing in brand value by 78%. This is a reflection of buoyant oil and gas receipts underpinning many Middle East economies and the growth of Islamic banking. However, the South American region experienced the highest growth in brand value increasing by 84%. This is a reflection of the resilient performance in the region, particularly in the Brazilian banking market.

US dominance of the global banking industry has declined with a decrease in the number of US banks in the Global Top 500 down from 95 in 2008 to 85 in 2009. Although US bank brands recovered during 2009 the overall increase in brand value was only 29%.

Whilst the number of European banks in the Global 500 has increased from 174 to 197, the number of UK banks has fallen from 24 to 22. This suggests that recovery in continental Europe – most particularly in France, Spain and Switzerland – has left British banks behind. European bank brands have recovered significantly growing their brand value in aggregate by 67%.

Asian markets continue to do well but grew by only 31% in brand value because Japanese brand values declined by 3% reflecting the continued instability of the Japanese market. By contrast India and China saw brand value growth by 137% and 58% respectively.

2009 is also the first year that a Russian bank – Sberbank – has made the Top 20 (No.15), with significant growth of 160% on the previous year, bringing its market capitalisation to US$51.1bn and its brand value to US$11.7bn.

Banks in the Pacific region, including Australia and New Zealand, have seen a recovery with growth of 58%.

“This year’s BrandFinance® Global Banking 500 shows how significant the recovery of global banking brands has been,” explains David Haigh, CEO of Brand Finance plc.  “The value of the Top 500 global bank brands is now 4% higher than in 2008, prior to the banking crisis. The total value of The top 500 global bank brands is $US 716bn, an increase of 49% on 2009.There has been a significant shift in the balance of power globally away from the US and towards banks in emerging markets.”

Brian Caplen, editor of The Banker added: "In the wake of the financial crisis, banks are approaching the issue of branding with renewed vigour. However this cannot be a short term project. What Brand Finance’s rankings show is that successful banks such as HSBC and Santander work at getting all the parts of the operation to work in favour of the branding."”

Ends.

Media Information:

Teamspirit Public Relations
Howard Robinson
M:  07702 153537
E:   hrobinson@teamspiritpr.com

Notes For Editors

First published in 2006, The BrandFinance® Global Banking 500 was the first publicly available study analyzing the financial value of the world’s top 100 banking brands. For the third year in succession, the analysis has been extended to the world’s Top 500 banking brands. It is published annually and incorporates data from all listed companies globally. Each brand is accorded a brand rating: a benchmarking study of the strength, risk and future potential of a brand relative to its competitor set as well as a brand value: a summary measure of the financial strength of the brand.

About Brand Finance

Brand Finance is an independent global business focused on advising strongly branded organisations on how to maximise value through effective management of their brands and intangible assets. Since it was founded in 1996, Brand Finance has performed thousands of branded business, brand and intangible asset valuations worth trillions of dollars.

Its clients include international brand owners, tax authorities, IP lawyers and investment banks. Its work is frequently peer-reviewed by the big four audit practices and its reports have been accepted by various regulatory bodies, including the UK Takeover Panel.

Brand Finance is headquartered in London and has a network of international offices in Amsterdam, Athens, Bangalore, Barcelona, Cape Town, Colombo, Dubai, Geneva, Helsinki, Hong Kong, Istanbul, Lisbon, Madrid, Moscow, New York, Paris, Sao Paulo, Sydney, Singapore, Toronto and Zagreb.