The founding principle of the savings banks is to support as many people as possible in building up their wealth. In this context, saving through investments is becoming increasingly important: funds, shares and ETFs are playing a growing role in long-term wealth accumulation, as well as in private provision and retirement planning. Easy access to the capital market for broad sections of the population is therefore becoming increasingly important. This is where the savings banks can make a significant contribution. Not least because of their public mandate, they are in a position to make this access widely available – and thus to strengthen economic participation.
In response to the growing demand for digital securities offerings, the Savings Banks Finance Group therefore developed S‑Neo, a new platform for trading securities, in 2025. Following a successful development and pilot phase over the past few months, it has been available to customers of almost all savings banks since the summer of 2026. The platform is directly integrated into the “Savings Bank” app and enables trading in ETFs, other funds and shares, as well as setting up savings plans. In this way, S‑Neo utilises the app’s reach and, as a first step, provides around 20 million users with low-threshold access to the capital market for building their wealth. From 2027, this option is also set to be made available to non-customers of the savings banks.