The banking sector must rethink its role in urban transformation, Luca Bertalot, secretary general of the European Mortgage Federation and the European Covered Bond Council (ECBC), said at a panel session as part of the 13th session of the World Urban Forum (WUF13) in Baku, Report informs.
He estimates that the world is on the threshold of a new urban revolution, with cities already accounting for 80% of Europe's gross domestic product.
"We need to plan and design for a new demographic revolution," Bertalot noted, noting that artificial intelligence provides banks with fundamentally new tools. The expert believes that banking institutions must integrate into a new ecosystem built around five priority areas for financing urban transformation.
"Housing holds a key position among them: in European countries, two-thirds of bank balances are formed by mortgage loans. Transforming the approach to housing finance will inevitably lead to changes in the entire range of credit products – from loans for building modernization to infrastructure lending," he added.