ING: Hamers draws up his European masterplan

Illustration: Britt Spencer

There is no hiding the passion with which Ralph Hamers has pursued digitalization, since his promotion to ING’s chief executive five years ago.

He has hammered home the Dutch bank’s internet-era advantages, making it stand out from the pack of European banks still struggling to find a place in the post-crisis world. From being forced to sell insurer NN Group as a condition of its 2008 bailout, now it can even contemplate Europe’s most important bank acquisition for more than a decade: Commerzbank.