Concluding Remarks

This chapter concludes that navigating through various lenses—geographical, structural, and regulatory—helps to unveil the diverse consequences attached to different classifications in the financial sector. It also illuminates how intellectual currents have shaped financial systems (saint-simonism, liberalism and federalism). It warns on the peril of “mammoth entities”, more common in universal banking, and the need to focus on encouraging competition and enhancing ethical behaviour. This book explores the intricate relationship between the corporate structure of BBFCs and regulatory frameworks, framing it as a “chicken and egg situation” in their genesis in the USA. It elucidates how chain and group banking emerged to circumvent branching restrictions in the US, utilizing holding company structures to facilitate interstate banking before regulatory interventions like the BHCA aimed to curb such practices. As a general conclusion, the SPOE strategy prevails or best fits the three selected models (Germany, UK and the USA). Contrary to the Santander case, the SPOE strategy proved to be more resilient in the three chosen SIFIs: DB, Barclays and Citi.