PYMNTS Daily Data Dive: Wells Fargo Mobile Downloads Suffer

The Wells Fargo fake account scandal continues to have some far reaching impacts.

A new report revealed the bank’s mobile banking business has also taken a hit. According to data from SurveyMonkey, in the 30 days after the news broke about the scandal the number of mobile app downloads declined by 7.7 percent compared to the previous 30 days.

Though the financial services company has surely received a major hit from both a reputation perspective and also from a business perspective – given some states are refusing to do business with the embattled bank – this data gives a glimpse at how deep that impact goes.

“Is Wells Fargo’s negative growth in new mobile app users in this recent period a direct result of potential and existing customers deciding not to do business with the bank due to its scam? We can’t definitively say,” wrote SurveyMonkey. “Wells Fargo has blamed a post-scandal downturn in account openings on ‘lower … marketing activity’ (among other things). If Wells Fargo has shifted its marketing efforts from promoting the app to addressing the scam, then that could certainly impact adoption (i.e., download) rates of the Wells Fargo Mobile app.”

Here are the numbers:

10,015 | The lowest number of mobile app downloads Wells Fargo has seen since its scandal broke

78% | The six-month low of Wells Fargo’s retention rates for its mobile app

7 million | The number of weekly active users the bank’s mobile app typically has

140,000 | An estimated number of how many users weren’t returning to Wells Fargo’s mobile app from one week to the next after the scandal

 7.7% | The percentage of decline in mobile app downloads in the 30 days after the Wells Fargo scandal broke