Bankinter has launched two new deposit savings offerings as it continues its expansion into the Irish market.
The Spanish lender - which also owns Avant Money - has launched a six month deposit account with an AER of 2.62%, along with a one year fixed account with an AER of 2.3%.
Customers will be able to to deposit between €2,000 and €200,000 in the accounts, and will be able to access up to 25% of their funds over the course of the term.
"The six month rate is particularly compelling," said Ciarán Byrne, head of everyday banking at Bankinter Ireland. "So that's 1.1% more than you would get with the three main banks today - we think it is a compelling offer."
The most recent data from the Central Bank found that Irish households had €170 billion on deposit at the end of October 2025, with most of that was sitting in low or no-interest accounts.
Analysis by the Central Bank earlier last year suggested that households had missed out on almost €800m in interest as a result of their reluctance to move their money to longer term savings or investment accounts.
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Bankinter hopes to convince consumers to change that habit - though Mr Byrne said they were also aware of the challenge they have in convincing people to entrust their money to a company they likely have no previous relationship with.
"It's a challenge we're aware of and it's something that we've had to deal with in our other products as well," said Mr Byrne.
"[But] we've been able to generate substantial market share - in our mortgage business, we're writing about 7% of new mortgages in the country and we think there's an opportunity for us to do the same for deposits," he added.
The launch of the deposit accounts marks the latest move by Bankinter into the Irish market.
The Spanish lender arrived here in 2018 through the acquistion of credit card firm Avantcard.
In 2020 it launched a mortgage offering here, renaming the business Avant Money in the process.
Having secured a full Irish banking licence last year, it now plans to begin to offering current accounts to customers in Ireland - while also phasing out the Avant brand in favour of Bankinter.
"We'll run a series of [current account] pilots first because we want to really make sure that we're getting the customer experience right," Mr Byrne said.
"We're getting all of our operations right before we start to take material customers on board - so it will be a process through this year," he added.
However he denied that the bank was moving slowly in its Irish expansion, and said that there had been a lot of complex background work done to ensure it was in a good position to compete.
"That is brand new and that has taken us a bit of time to get right because we absolutely do not want to bring something to market until it's ready," he said.
One growth opportunity the bank has said it is not interested in is the acquisition of PTSB, with Bankinter CEO Gloria Ortiz last month flatly ruling out making an offer.
Mr Byrne said the company was focused on organic growth.
"Gloria Ortiz, who is our group CEO, was quite clear that the strategy in Ireland is one of organic growth rather than acquisitions. And that's exactly what this product launch is about today," he said.
"There is certainly value there [in PTSB], but I think that value comes at a price," he concluded.
