N26 is a smartphone only bank that was originally launched in Germany and has big backers like Peter Thiel behind it; Vincent Haupert, a PhD student at the University of Erlangen-Nuernberg, told the Chaos Communications Congress in Hamburg how he and two colleagues found N26 security defenses riddled with holes that could have been used to defraud thousands of users; Haupert presented his findings to the bank and they have since stated that the issues found have been addressed. Source
Shareholders and regulators have approved Sichuan XW Bank as the new name for one of China's newest online banks; Sichuan XW Bank is supported with capital by Xiaomi, an electronics and home appliances manufacturer; its leading competitors in the online banking market in China will be WeBank and MYBank. Source
Many staff members at the challenger banks are working from home with Starling and Revolut opting to split staff between...
European digital bank N26 has increased its customer base by 200,000 users in just 14 months as digital bank solutions become increasingly more popular in Europe; the company has also reported a new transactions milestone of 3 billion euros ($3.1 billion); the Berlin-based company is targeting tech savvy millennials and has introduced a number of competitive features to attract new customers including a lending product that allows for mobile loans up to 25,000 euros ($26,556); the business has raised over $55 million in capital and is planning to expand to Britain in 2017. Source
Initially a German-only digital bank, N26 is now expanding to 17 countries across the continent including Spain, Italy, Greece, Ireland and Slovakia; according to Valentin Stalf, founder and CEO of N26, the company is looking at "disrupting retail banking further" with this expansion; the digital bank offers an eight minute signup process, real time money transfers and budgeting tools; in coming years they are looking to add new products like investments, savings, insurance products and artificial intelligence based features. Source
Ron Shevlin digs into Square and why the company and its stock price continues to do very well; he looks...
K-Bank has gained authorization to open South Korea's first online bank; firm is an affiliate of Alibaba-owned Ant Financial; Kakao Bank is also involved in the final approval process to open the country's second online bank. Source
UK digital bank Monzo is reportedly laying off 120 staff due to the challenges of the current economic situation; this...
Leading UK digital bank Starling Bank has raised an additional £40m in funding, this is in additional to the £60m...
UK digital bank startup Monzo has listed a new crowdfunding campaign on Crowdcube and is seeking to raise 2.5 million British pounds ($3.09 million) as part of a broader fundraising for a total of 22 million British pounds ($27.18 million); Business Insider provides details on growth plans outlined in the crowdfunding campaign; Monzo is currently showing a seven year plan to an initial public offering which will include an estimated 75 million British pounds ($92.67 million) in new capital in the next five years; Monzo says it will raise capital again in May 2018 and it expects to report a profit after 2020; the firm has been granted a banking license and will begin offering deposit accounts as well as overdraft lending which it expects to help improve profitability. Source