85% of accounts in Ulster Bank and KBC Bank Ireland now closed

Latest figures from the Central Bank show that a total of 86,298 current and deposit accounts were closed in Ulster Bank and KBC Bank in four weeks to the end of March.

As at end-March 20231, 167,988 current accounts remained open in Ulster Bank and KBC Bank, of which, 60,181 were deemed by the banks as the customer’s ‘primary’ account.

Both banks are due to leave the Irish market this year. 

In total, 85 per cent of current accounts that were open at the beginning of 2022 were either closed or inactive as at end-March.

Latest information from the Central Bank said this represented a reduction of 57 per cent when compared with corresponding four week period to end-February, when there was a significant acceleration in bank initiated closures.

This brings the total number of accounts closed since the beginning of 2022 at these two banks to 986,023.

Of these, 513,785 were current accounts, while the remaining 472,238 were deposit accounts.

A total of 49,555 accounts were opened in the four weeks to end-March, a decrease of 53 per cent when compared with the corresponding period to end-February. 

The Central Bank believes the account opening figures are less related to migrating accounts, and are proportionally more impacted by organic ‘business as usual’ growth.

In total, 1,156,638 current and deposit accounts were opened across the three remaining retail banks in Ireland since the beginning of 2022.