Angola’s Secretary of State for Finance and Treasury, Ottoniel dos Santos, said on Friday that the ‘real test’ for the Angolan banking sector is not the number of correspondent banks it holds, but ensuring that ‘confidence translates into more investment.’
The official was speaking at the opening of the XVI Banking Forum, an initiative organised by newspaper Expansão, held under the theme ‘The Internationalisation of Banking in the Capital Markets and the Return of Correspondents: Challenges and Opportunities.’
‘The real test will be knowing whether this new confidence translates into more investment, more competitive companies, more skilled employment and better opportunities for Angolans. That is, after all, the greater purpose of any financial system: to serve the economy in order to improve people’s lives,’ dos Santos said.
A correspondent bank is a financial institution that provides services to another bank located in a different country, enabling it to conduct operations in a currency or market where it has no direct presence.
Since 2025, two international banks — US-based JPMorgan and Germany’s Deutsche Bank — have re-established direct correspondent banking relationships with Angolan financial institutions.
According to dos Santos, the most important asset under discussion is ‘not only financial infrastructure or correspondent banking relationships,’ but trust itself, ‘because it is on trust that markets are built, investment is mobilised and development is financed.’
The secretary of state described the chosen theme as timely, stressing that discussing the internationalisation of banking and the return of correspondent banks ‘is, in reality, talking about Angola’s growing integration into the global economy.’
‘In recent years, the debate focused on the loss of correspondent banking relationships, the difficulties of accessing international financial markets and the resulting constraints for companies, investors and citizens,’ he recalled.
Dos Santos highlighted that Angola has been witnessing the gradual restoration of those relationships and growing interest from international financial institutions in strengthening their presence within the Angolan banking sector.
This evolution, the secretary of state said, is the result of a demanding reform process, reinforced supervisory mechanisms, improved compliance standards, efforts to combat money laundering and terrorism financing, stronger institutions and consolidated macroeconomic stability.
During a roundtable discussion on the forum’s theme, participants noted that internationalisation represents a significant challenge for the banking sector. Juvelino Domingos, executive administrator of Banco Angolano de Investimentos (BAI), underlined that Angola remains under the scrutiny of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the intergovernmental body responsible for combating money laundering and the financing of terrorism.
Source: Diário Económico
Original article: https://www.diarioeconomico.co.mz/2026/07/20/mundo/angola/angola-governo-defende-que-confianca-no-sector-bancario-deve-traduzir-se-em-mais-investimento/
