A cocktail of regulatory reform and unprecedented political pressure is fostering a unique relationship between major banks and governments. This promises to significantly reform the previous European banking structure. What this new system will look like, few can quite tell.

Added to this, major banks are struggling to adapt to a constrained economic environment in which cost pressures and profits are major concerns. These concerns are heightened with the arrival of new models for banking and new entrants to the market. All of these players are competing to attract a new 21st century customer, with rapidly evolving preferences and attitudes towards banking.

Despite calls to the contrary, this leaves little room for inertia.

The European Retail Banking Summit will bring together over 150 leaders of the retail banking industry, with policymakers, regulators, investors and customers. Together they will explore how European retail banking is on the edge of revolutionary change.