Apple iBank: What Are Odds Of Having One, And Will You Bank With It?

From an Apple fan's point of view, one could trust the Cupertino tech giant in terms of the wide range of products it offers to the customers. Parting with hundreds of dollars each year for laying hands on Apple gadgets does tell that story. But would you ever trust Apple with all your money? Would you trust Apple with your savings and consider banking with an iBank?

Times Moneyland talked about a recent survey that showed that almost half the people who use Apple products would like to bank with Apple.

Conducted among 5,000 consumers in the U.S. and UK, the survey by marketing consulting company KAE and research and survey company Toluna showed that only 10 percent of the overall respondents said they would trust Apple with their savings. But when the field of respondents was narrowed to include only consumers who have already own Apple products, that number soared to 43 percent.

The impressive level of trust generated between Apple and their customers was the main reason given for a possible switch to an Apple Bank, with around two-thirds citing their trust in the brand (66%) as the primary reason, and just over half claiming they think Apple would make their account easy to access and manage, as well as providing a reliable service, the survey report said.

The majority of respondents who said they would be willing to let Apple watch over their money were technology savvy, with 81 percent saying they already bank online and 62 percent saying they use their smartphone for personal banking.

Although there has not been any indication from Apple about its plans to jump into financial services market, the idea is not something very outlandish as it may sound at first. Diving into the financial services isn't all that much of a stretch for a tech company: Google, which started out as a mere search engine, has been trying for some time now to gain traction for a mobile wallet platform on its Android devices, the Times Moneyland report said.

Apple has had its own iTunes payment system for several years now, and rumors suggest that the company is planning to take the service mobile, said an iDownload Blog report.

According to David Rankin, Managing Director of KAE, thanks to a proven ability to cross-sell additional products, along with the highest sales per square foot of any retailer and an affluent customer base, Apple can make its ground as one of the most profitable consumer banks in recent times.

Once the power of the Apple brand and its options for growth are understood, it tends to prompt one of three responses from financial institutions: accelerated invention, defensive benchmarking or blissful issue avoidance, Rankin said.

We know that not everyone would be impressed by the arrival of an 'iBank'; we also know that the boldness of the next big Apple move will inspire and terrify in equal measure, he added.

This research tells us Apple customers perceive a fit where at first glance we would assume the brand could not travel, said Lee Powney, Chief Commercial Officer at KAE, in a statement.

What if Apple Does Open an iBank?

It would be very 'un-Apple' to simply enter into a market without changing the terms of competition, Powney said. Do you think that other banks would need to watch their backs if Apple ever enter into the banking sector?

According to the survey, of those surveyed in the UK, almost one in five currently bank with Lloyds Banking Group (18 percent) or Barclays (14 percent), while in the U.S. almost a quarter (23 percent) are with Bank of America and around one in ten with JP Morgan Chase (11 percent).

Based on all those figures mentioned in the survey, Fast Company has come up with an interesting estimation:

If you extrapolate them up to the entire U.S. and U.K. populations, then that would mean Apple would instantly have around 37 million individual customers for its banking service in just two nations. For context, Bank of America (one of the largest companies in the world) operates in the U.S. and over 40 other countries, and had 'approximately 57 million consumer and small business relationships' as of 2010. And if Apple actually did launch an iBank, because there are so many hundreds of millions of iPhones, iPads, and iPod touches out there (to say nothing of Macs) we can imagine that very swiftly the attractions of an iBank would bump Apple's potential customer base up by tens of millions more.