Country’s banks lose 2,066 staff, 655 branches in 2020 – BdP
According to the central bank (BoP), the banking sector in Portugal lost 2,066 workers and 655 branches in 2020 compared to 2019.
Portuguese banks lost 2,066 workers and 655 branches in 2020 compared to 2019, reaching the lowest number of branches since 1996 and the lowest number of employees at least since 1992, the central bank (BoP) disclosed on Tuesday.
According to the long series of the Portuguese banking sector, updated today with information for 2020, banking ended last year with 61,740 workers, compared to 63,806 in 2019, and a total of 4,868 branches, compared to 5,523 in 2019.
One has to go back to 1996 to find a lower number of branches (4,844), and the downward trend has been visible since 2011, after reaching in 2010 the highest number of bank branches, a total of 8,106.
Where employees are concerned, the figure for 2020 is the lowest since there have been data available for this indicator (1992, when there were 63,752 employees).
The highest number of employees in the Portuguese banking system was reached in 2011, with 80,169 employees, and has been decreasing since then.
The reduction in employees in 2020 occurred mainly in banks’ external activity, with 1,367 departures, with the remaining 699 departures occurring in business in Portugal, which ended last year with 45,745 employees, the lowest since the beginning of the BoP long series (1990).
To the external activity of banks were devoted 15,995 workers in 2020, the lowest number since 2006 (15,275).
The long time series is a database on the banking system that includes historical information on financial indicators, loans to customers, interest rates, human resources, branch distribution and payment systems since 1990.
The banking sector long series were released for the first time in 2019 with the aim of providing analysts and researchers with integrated, consistent and scrutinised information on the banking sector in Portugal. The database has been updated annually.
