ThetaRay's 2026 UK Banking & Fintech Trust Report has found that 88% of UK consumers would leave their primary bank if it failed to prevent money laundering or terrorist financing.
The ThetaRay UK Banking & Fintech Trust Report 2026, published ahead of the Global RegTech Summit, surveyed 1.023 UK-based respondents via research firm Centiment. The sample was distributed across age groups and designed to be representative of the UK population.
Compliance as a retention factor
The headline finding is accompanied by a closely related figure: 87% say they would actively discourage others from using a bank linked to money laundering or sanctions violations. Separately, 81% of respondents now rank AML effectiveness as a top priority when selecting a new provider.
These figures indicate that what has traditionally been treated as a regulatory and operational function is increasingly a visible factor in consumer decision-making. The report frames this as a structural shift rather than a marginal trend, particularly given that banking has been ranked the most trusted subsector in finance since 2023, according to separately cited data.
The friction dimension
According to the official press release, the report also identifies a tension between security processes and customer experience. Whilst 88% of respondents currently express trust in their banks, 80% say they would switch providers due to repeated inconvenience from security checks. At the same time, 96% demand real-time transparency when transactions are frozen, including clear explanations of onboarding requirements.
This points to a conflict inherent in rule-based compliance frameworks: broad transaction monitoring may generate friction that erodes customer trust even when no wrongdoing is involved. The report suggests that such systems are poorly suited to meeting simultaneous demands for rigour and speed.
Digital adoption context adds a further dimension. Despite the growth of fintech services, 68% of respondents still rely on high-street banks as their primary provider, though 28% have integrated fintech products into their primary banking stack. The coexistence of traditional and digital preferences suggests that competitive pressure on incumbents is real, but not yet dominant.
Methodology and framing
Brad Levy, CEO of ThetaRay, noted that switching banks is no longer a significant barrier for consumers and that trust, convenience, and AML capability are now assessed together. In addition, Garima Chaudhary, VP Financial Crime & Compliance AI at ThetaRay, stated that legacy rule-based systems present a dual risk: generating false positives that affect the customer experience whilst remaining insufficiently adaptive to detect more sophisticated financial crime.
The report was released in the context of growing regulatory focus on financial crime in the UK, where the Financial Conduct Authority has signalled continued expectations around AML controls for both banks and fintechs operating in the market.
