The number of credit institutions headquartered in the EU continued to decrease from 3,419 in 2014 to 3,278 in 2015.
Total assets of these credit institutions also decreased in the last year from € 34,491 billion to €33,798 billionn. The decrease was to a large extent driven by non-euro area countries, the European Central Bank said in its regular report on the sector.
The end-2015 data covered 342 banking groups together with 3,229 stand-alone credit institutions, and include data for 972 foreign-controlled branches and subsidiaries operating in the EU.