Growing Pains for Customer Relationships

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Growing consumer banking balances turned out to be easier than growing customers in 2025, against the backdrop of falling rates and overall lower money in motion. Based on benchmarks and analysis from Curinos’ Retail Deposit Analyzer, over half of financial institutions (56%) were able to achieve consumer deposit balance growth in 2025, while the remainder saw balance declines.

But it was a different story for customer growth. Just over a third of FIs, 36%, were able to grow customers, while the majority experienced declines (see chart). This reflects a slow shift as consumers may be entrenching, consolidating their bank accounts and closing their non-primary accounts now that rates have fallen from their peak. In measuring both deposit and customer growth by quadrant in 2025, the most populated was the one with FIs that lost both balances and customers, where 36% experienced declines in both.

Customer and Deposit Growth | Traditional FIs | 2025

Source(s): Curinos Consumer Deposit Analyzer, Curinos Analysis. | Note(s): Simple averages displayed. Consumer balances only. Branch FIs only.

The outlook for 2026? As we head into what’s likely to be a slower-growth economy, so will consumer deposit and customer growth likely remain a challenge. And if the growing pains continue for customers, that will translate eventually to higher competition for consumer deposits, especially among banks with a higher concentration of non-primary account holders.