Loyalty is slipping too, as more account openers walk away from their main bank
Fewer than half of consumers across Canada's seven largest metropolitan areas opened a new financial account or product over the past year, a retreat from the clear majority who did so a year earlier.
Account openings fell to 46 percent of the 17,762 people surveyed in 2026, down from about 57 percent of 42,693 respondents in 2025, the Financial Post reported, citing an annual study by Environics Research.
The seven markets include Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal.
The slowdown matters because account opening is "the front end of future financial growth," said Heidi Wilson, Environics' vice-president of financial analysis, in comments reported by the Post.
She said fewer new accounts leave financial institutions fewer chances to acquire, deepen, or defend customer relationships.
The Financial Post reported that account openers now split almost evenly between staying and leaving: 24 percent opened a new account with their current bank, down from 33 percent a year earlier, while 22 percent went to a newer firm.
"This suggests the default advantage of the primary financial institutions is weakening," Wilson said.
Consumers once added products at their main bank out of convenience, she noted, but the 2026 results show them shopping around more actively when they need something new.
The country's largest lenders still draw the most switchers, though with a narrowing lead. They captured 42 percent of all new retail account relationships between March 2025 and May 2026 while accounting for 62 percent of departing customers.
Digital-first institutions, meanwhile, took 26 percent of new acquisitions against a 12 percent share of attrition.
"That imbalance suggests the major banks continue to win substantial business, but not enough to replace what is moving elsewhere," Wilson said.
She said the Big Five retain advantages of scale, trust, and existing relationships, but "those advantages no longer guarantee they will win a customer's next account choice."
The study did not identify a cause, but Wilson pointed to slowing immigration as one possible factor, the Post reported.
Newcomer acquisition has been "a meaningful strategy for many Canadian banks," she said, especially in major urban markets.
She said fewer newcomers entering the system would leave banks competing harder for a smaller pool of new accounts.
According to Statistics Canada, the national population stood at an estimated 41,417,056 on April 1, 2026, a decline of 55,025 people, or 0.1 percent, from the start of the year, and Canada admitted 83,149 permanent immigrants in the first quarter, down 20.2 percent from 104,210 a year earlier.
Ottawa has moved to curb that intake.
Under the 2026-2028 Immigration Levels Plan, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada set permanent resident admissions at 380,000 a year through 2028 and capped new temporary resident arrivals at 385,000 in 2026.
The cap forms part of a goal to bring the temporary population below 5 percent of the total by the end of 2027.
The Financial Post reported that Shalabh Garg, an analyst at Veritas Investment Research Corp. who covers the Big Six, was not surprised by the decline, saying the large banks aim to retain customers by selling them multiple products and charging premiums to those unwilling to consolidate their banking.
Among customers who switched over the past year, 35 percent moved their primary financial firm, which Wilson called a "much bigger loss" for providers trying to keep them, the Post reported.
More than one-third of switchers said their former firm could have done something to hold on to their business.
