TORONTO — It’s not every day, or even every decade, that a big foreign bank decides to have a go at Canada’s retail banking market.
The Canadian market, where the Big Six banks made about $54 billion in profits in 2024, should be tempting because it consistently shows margins well ahead of other regions, said Spence. “We didn't have to use the state to stabilize the banking system because in a sense, as taxpayers, we're bailing them out every day.”
It makes sense to fund its auto loans through deposits, since they're cheaper than wholesale funding. But it's not clear how many Canadians would want to switch over their banking for just a higher interest rate on their deposits, said Liquornik. “They really lack a clear competitive advantage," said Scholtz. “Traditional bread-and-butter retail banking is not something that really scales well across borders.”