How Banks Are Activating Dormant Retail Investors — With Intelligent App Integrations

Across digital banking and wealth platforms, the pattern is consistent: customers open investing accounts, explore the experience, and then… do very little. Dormant portfolios, low engagement, and limited trading activity mean banks are monetising only a fraction of their potential retail investor base – despite demand for wealth products continuing to grow. 

During a recent Temenos sales call, Fabian Grapengiesser, CEO of StockRepublic, shared how banks are leveraging their smart app integrations to solve this challenge, turning real investor behavior into inspiration – without embarking on multi‑year rebuilds of their wealth platforms. 

The Core Problem: Access Isn’t the Issue – Confidence Is 

As Fabian explains, most retail investors don’t lack tools – they lack conviction. 

“Most of the customers are dormant or passive. The main reason is actually that people don’t know what to do. What should I buy, and when?” 

In many institutions, only around 30% of investing-customers actively generate revenue, while the majority remain inactive even after onboarding. Traditional levers – market research, analyst reports, static insights – often fail to provide the reassurance every day investors need to act. 

StockRepublic approaches the problem from a different angle: showing customers what successful investors inside their own bank are actually doing, in a way that feels familiar, relevant, and trusted. 

Social Investing, Powered by Real Behavior 

At the heart of StockRepublic is a social investing model built on real holdings and transaction data, shared anonymously and securely by customers who opt in. 

Instead of relying purely on external opinions, the platform surfaces: 

• What top‑performing investors are buying and selling 

• How portfolios are constructed and diversified over time 

• Aggregated sentiment across stocks, ETFs, and funds 

• Peer benchmarking based on long‑term, risk‑adjusted performance 

“We’re relying on what real people within the bank are actually doing,” Fabian explains. “That’s the fuel for our engine – holdings and transactions.” 

For retail investors, this creates clarity. For banks, it creates relevance and trust – two prerequisites for sustained engagement. 

Real‑World Impact at a Glance 

From live client deployments, StockRepublic is delivering measurable commercial results: 

• Up to 75% of previously dormant investing-customers re‑activated 

• Trading frequency increased by ~50% (from two to three trades per month on average) 

These outcomes matter because they are achieved without encouraging reckless behavior. 

“We don’t want people to just trade more and lose money,” says Fabian. “We want them to take better decisions. Better returns are good for the customer – and for the bank in the long run.” 

The result is a virtuous cycle: more confident investors engage more consistently, remain active longer, and generate recurring revenue. 

Designed for Time‑to‑Market, Not Long Build Cycles 

The recurring theme in the session was speed. Banks want differentiated experiences – but not at the cost of multi‑year transformation programs. 

StockRepublic supports two complementary deployment models, allowing institutions to move fast and retain flexibility. 

White‑Label, End‑to‑End 

Banks can launch a fully branded social investing experience embedded into their existing digital channels. 

“We serve and do everything from A to Z,” Fabian notes. “It’s a very good setup for time‑to‑market – launching without heavy internal IT resources.” 

This approach enables rapid rollout, early validation, and immediate value realization. 

Modular APIs and Widgets 

For institutions that want deeper control over the user experience, StockRepublic also exposes its capabilities through APIs. 

“Everything we have is also available as APIs. Banks can choose the components they want – social interaction, benchmarking, or insight feeds.” 

In practice, many banks start with a white‑label deployment to capture quick wins, then evolve toward deeper native integration over time. 

Embedded Insights, Enhanced by AI 

Beyond the social layer, StockRepublic is increasingly focused on personalized, AI‑driven insight feeds. 

These combine: 

• A customer’s own portfolio and holdings 

• Relevant market movements and news 

• Aggregated behavior and sentiment from high‑performing investors 

Delivered as a lightweight feed, these insights complement existing wealth journeys – helping banks add intelligence and relevance without redesigning their platforms. 

Who Sees the Biggest Gains? 

StockRepublic’ s strongest impact is seen among: 

• New investors unsure how to get started 

• Occasional investors trading once or twice a month 

“That’s where we see the really powerful effects,” Fabian explains. “Heavy traders already know what they’re doing. Beginners and average investors gain confidence very quickly.” 

These segments also represent the largest – and most under‑monetized – portions of most retail banks’ investing customer base. 

A Practical Accelerator for Digital Wealth Strategies 

As wealth management becomes increasingly digital, banks are rethinking how to: 

• Increase self‑directed investing engagement 

• Improve monetization without pushing advice models 

• Differentiate without building everything themselves 

By combining social proof, behavioral data, and rapid deployment, StockRepublic acts as an accelerator – not a replacement – for modern wealth platforms. 

“Building this yourself would be a multi‑year project,” Fabian says. “This lets banks move much faster.”