Albania’s e-banking accounts increased by 37% during 2016
Albania-Internet banking services in Albania have significantly increased over the past year. According to a recent report of the Bank of Albania, the number of accounts linked to the Internet has reached the figure of 209.000, up by 37% compared with 2015.
Last year has marked a positive trend in expanding the use of this service, after a very modest growth in 2015.
In recent years, Albania is narrowing the gap in terms of internet and technologies usage, which has paved the way for their use in financial services offered by the country’s banking system.
Internet banking services are already offered by most banks, at a time when running costs are at minimal levels, which seems to have boosted the number of users.
It is estimated that nearly 6% of all accounts in the banking system can be accessed via the Internet, while a year ago the ratio was at 4.6%.
Albania’s progress is considered significant, keeping in mind the inherited gap in the basic use of financial services. Nearly a decade ago, only a minority of Albanians had a bank account, while recent years have witnessed an evident and rapid growth.
This year, the number of bank accounts in the country has reached a record 3.44 million, thus exceeding the population of the country.
The number of individual accounts in Albania is 3.2 million, or an average of 1.11 bank accounts per capita.
The figure shows that Albania is rapidly approaching regional levels of usage of banking services. The average for Southeastern Europe is 1.3 bank accounts per capita, while in European Union countries this figure is at the level of 2.3 per capita.
Ersuin Shehu/RTV SCAN
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