Last Updated on: 21st November 2023, 11:06 pm
As numbers go, Toronto-headquartered digital bank Black Banx is the third largest in the industry after announcing last week they’ve reached 28 million customers worldwide. In terms of notability and numbers, this puts Black Banx only a few steps behind UK based Revolut with 30m clients, but is still a significant gap to Brazil’s world champion NuBank serving 75m customers.
On July 7, the Black Banx Group announced its semi-annual report, covering the first six months of the year. Having gained an extra 8 million customers since December 2022, the digital bank is onboarding more than 1.3 million new customers a month. This is an increase of their new client onboarding rate of 33% against the previous six months period, a substantial amount for any business, especially one that’s been going for nearly a decade. Revenue wise, the company increased its semi-annual results by 47% from US$ 680m second half of 2022 to US$ 997m for the first six months in 2023. Looking at these numbers, Black Banx can afford to expand into new territories.
Within the press release, Regional Chief Executive Officer MEA, Jabari Walker said, “Especially with the recent launch of our West African branch in Liberia, we are seeing an increase in business growth in that region.”
UK competitor Revolut is growing at almost one million customers a month. Its semi-annual report recently stated that the digital bank had reached over 30 million customers, an increase of five million in the last six months. Founded in 2015 by Nikolay Storonsky and Vlad Yatsenko, the neobank achieved annual revenues in 2022 of US$ 1.09bn.
Storonsky said: “Revolut is growing at almost one million customers per month. This is a fantastic achievement for the company and reaching 30 million customers is another important milestone we are immensely proud of as we continue to grow and scale at pace.”
Revolut products and services:
- Currency exchange
- International payments
- Global debit card
- Investing opportunities
- Overseas medical insurance
- Split bills
Customers are able to earn up to 3.44% annual interest that is paid daily when using the apps savings vaults. Revolut also allows customers to “get more” from the brands they love. Users can enjoy up to 30% cashback when eating out at specific restaurants, save when spending with their Revolut card, get insider offers from top brands, and earn cashback every time they spend.
With one of the largest customer bases in the world, Brazilian based NuBank has approximately 75 million customers, with 70 million of these registered in Brazil. According to Brazilian Central Bank data from the end of 2022, NuBank added 19.1 million customers last year. What makes NuBank stand out is its ability to issue lines of credit and personal loans, an element that Revolut has been fighting towards in the UK but repeatedly left empty handed.
NuBank products and services:
- Interest while holding money in account
- Send and receive payments
- Free and unlimited bank transfers
- Better interest returns than a savings account
- No hidden fees
Founded in 2013, NuBank has recorded an all-time high revenue of US$ 1.6bn for the first quarter of 2023. Half of all adults in Brazil are customers of NuBank, a statistic that most companies dream of. So, what did they do differently? A lot of it has to do with the fintech scene 10 years ago in Sao Paulo and nationwide in Brazil. Its banking system was based on high fees and a lack of tech, with the traditional banking system taking the reign. When NuBank arrived on the scene, it was new and offered a solution, filling a gap in the market, hence their extraordinary numbers.
Black Banx on the other hand launched in 2015 with a mission to provide borderless banking to regular customers and those typically turned away from financial services. With semi-annual revenue of US$ 997m, Black Banx is still much smaller than NuBank, but can already score as number two on our list when it comes to comparing revenues. CEO Michael Gastauer created Black Banx with the vision of making an accessible bank globally available, with a focus on crypto. Black Banx opened its first office in Brazil in 2016 and London in 2018 which makes it a direct competitor to NuBank and Revolut.
Black Banx products and services:
- Private and business accounts in 28 FIAT and 2 crypto currencies
- International payments in 28 FIAT and 2 crypto currencies using local instant settlement systems where possible (e.g. FPS, SEPA instant credit, etc.)
- Inter platform instant payments in 28 FIAT and 2 crypto currencies
- Multi Currency Debit Card (plastic and metal) + virtual cards
- Real time 24/7 currency exchange services
- Real time 24/7 crypto trading services
- Interest bearing savings accounts in EURO, USD, GBP, JPY
- Batch upload or API to execute large number of payments for business customers
