Sberbank head: Half of Russia’s economy to turn digital by 2025

DAVOS, Switzerland, Jan 19 (PRIME) -- Digital economy will account for a half of Russia’s gross domestic product (GDP) by 2025, German Gref, head of the country’s biggest bank, Sberbank, said on Thursday at the World Economic Forum in the Swiss city of Davos.

“If we have a look at the share of the digital economy in the GDP, the U.K. has the highest indicator of some 10–11%. In Russia, it’s 4%. It will be about 50% by 2025,” Gref said.

“Over the next five years, we’ll see such changes in the banking sector that we haven’t seen for the last 50 years.”

Banks are already big IT companies, but still lag behind such behemoths as Google or Facebook. Sberbank makes a lot of effort to digitalize itself and will have to fire half of its personnel by 2025, Gref said.

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