Euskadi and Navarra will lose half of their bank branches in just fifteen years

Euskadi and Navarre They have lost almost half of the branches banks that they had fifteen years ago, a downturn that started in 2008 and has been accentuated after the pandemic. For example, Hego Euskal Herria has gone from 2,673 bank branches to the current 1,374 in recent years. That is why 48.57% of these stores are closed.

In concrete terms, the office network in the Basque Autonomous Community has decreased by 51%, with 1,034 fewer offices than in 2008. In Navarre it has decreased by 44% (317 fewer). If we take an annual average, we see that Euskadi has closed 69 offices per year, and Navarra 21.

Half the loss, in Bizkaia

By area, Bizkaia is the place where the most branches have closed. more than half of the total (530). Gipuzkoa has lost 266 and Álava 186. Most of these offices have disappeared from the capitals or larger cities.

As an example, Bilbao has lost 202 offices in these 15 years (55.2%), Vitoria-Gasteiz 143 (59.1%), Donostia 102 (54.5%) and Pamplona 72 (40.2%).

The following locations have closed the most offices in these years Barakaldo, Getxo, Portugalete, Durango, Irun and Eibar.

In general, in Euskadi, all municipalities lose, with the exception of Iruña Oka, which was established during this period.

Navarre, for its part, has lost 317 offices in the past eight years, the majority of which are in Pamplona (22.7%). Here too, they either have closed branches in all places or the number has been maintained.

No ATM or branch

In this process, 21 towns in Hego Euskal Herria have seen their last bank branches closed in the last fifteen years and have fallen to zero. These are:

Alava: Samaniego, Yécora, Kripan, Moreda de Álava, Zigoitia, Harana, Peñacerrada, Leza and Okondo.

Bizkaia: Atxondo, Bedia, Ea, Elantxobe, Gatika, Loiu, Iurreta.

Gipuzkoa: Elgeta, Bidania-Goiatz, Aia

Navarre: Anue and Jaurrieta.

So in Álava 43.1% of the places It has no bank office (4.2% of the population without an office), in Bizkaia 42.9% (3.4% of the population) and in Gipuzkoa 38.6% of cities do not have this service (2.6% of the population ). In Navarre this is 54% (6.7% of the population).

Two key years

In this evolution, there are two years that best explain the decline in the presence of banks in our cities. On the one hand, 2013, the year of the economic crisis and in which the sector began a thorough reorganization. This year alone, Euskadi lost 186 branches, and Navarra 24.

2021 It was also a key year: the post-pandemic era and the digitalization of the sector forced the closure of 139 offices in Euskadi and another 42 in Navarra.

Thickness

If we look at the evolution of bank branches, taking into account population density, we will see that in Euskadi we have the to have 9.1 offices per 10,000 inhabitants have 4.4 in just fifteen years (that is almost five fewer bank branches per 10,000 inhabitants). In Navarre, the number increased from 8.9 branches to 6 between 2015 and 2023.

Spain and Europe

Branch losses are also widespread across the state and in Europe. So between 2008 and 2022 the Spanish state passed to have 10.1 bank branches per 10,000 inhabitants currently 3.6. In fact, Spain (-61%) It is the country in the European Union that has lost the most banking presence, followed by Denmark (-60%).

France, on the other hand, only lost 13% of its branches during this period. The French country has the highest percentage of bank branches, 5 per 10,000 inhabitants. Spain, in turn, has similar data to Italy (3.6) and Portugal (3.4), and above Germany (2.4), Sweden or Denmark (they have less than two per 10,000 inhabitants).