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The 'Neo-Banks' Are Finally Having Their Moment (nytimes.com)

Posted by msmash on from the enough-already,-my-bank dept.

After the financial crisis 10 years ago, unhappy customers were expected to flee the megabanks for smaller competitors. It didn't happen. And the big banks became even more entrenched. Now another wave of alternative banks are at it again, and they say they've learned from the mistakes of the upstart banks that tried -- and failed -- before them. The New York Times: Chime, the biggest new name to pop up, has opened two million fee-free online checking accounts and is adding more customers each month than Wells Fargo or Citibank. That has inspired a crop of newer start-ups, like Empower, which started its first fee-free online checking accounts, with lots of digital bells and whistles, in October. Venture capitalists are pouring money into American start-ups that are offering basic banking services -- known as neo-banks or challenger banks. In 2018 so far, American neo-banks have gotten four times as much funding as they did last year, and 10 times as much funding as they did in 2015, according to data from CB Insights.

Big players from outside the consumer banking industry, like Square and Goldman Sachs, are also moving in. "In consumer banking, you have what is one of the largest industries in the United States, in terms of profits, and at the same time one of the least disrupted industries, and the most unpopular with consumers," said Andrei Cherny, the founder of Aspiration, a neo-bank that has attracted nearly a million customers. "Those three things create a perfect storm for disruption." The persistent unpopularity of big banks has been a boon to the newcomers. And they are helped by a new attitude among financial regulators who have grown more comfortable with online banking and young customers who have no hesitation about cashing a check or sending money on a phone.

58 of 121 comments (clear)

  1. Cash $$$ by rfengr · · Score: 2

    How do you withdraw a decent amount of cash from these virtual banks? An ATM is typically $300/day.

    1. Re:Cash $$$ by rfengr · · Score: 1

      Seriously though, if I want to buy something off Craigslist for $1k, there is no good way of doing that. I suppose you could write yourself a check and go to some seedy check cashing place.

    2. Re:Cash $$$ by 914 · · Score: 1

      Just call the bank.

      Many times can do it from the app now. The only limitation is that some ATMs limit the cash per transaction, but USAA credits you the ATM fee so you can just do five $500 withdrawals to get your $2500.

      My only gripe is that it's typically all in 20s.

    3. Re:Cash $$$ by puddingebola · · Score: 3, Funny

      Cash? Why would you need your cash? This is a "neo-bank." Nobody needs cash. You give the "neo-bank" your money, and then you experience the simulated bank. If you find yourself in an emergency where you need cash, you just create synergy.

    4. Re:Cash $$$ by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      You keep your old bank account open, transfer the money into it and then go to the counter to withdraw.

      Seriously though, when was the last time you needed to withdraw a large amount of cash? These days the electronic payment is pretty much instant.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    5. Re:Cash $$$ by Crash+Dummy+Redux · · Score: 1

      I use cash for food purchases at work. Every now and then the cafeteria cash registers won't accept debit/credit cards.

    6. Re:Cash $$$ by Crash+Dummy+Redux · · Score: 1

      These random comments that I've gotten over the last few days keep getting stranger and stranger. Care to explain?

    7. Re:Cash $$$ by Crash+Dummy+Redux · · Score: 1

      Only in America can you have such unreliable network providers unable to keep their links up during regular business hours.

    8. Re:Cash $$$ by Crash+Dummy+Redux · · Score: 1

      Who is Christopher Dale Reimer?

    9. Re:Cash $$$ by ceoyoyo · · Score: 1

      Can't you get a money order at a post office in the US?

    10. Re:Cash $$$ by someoneOtherThanMe · · Score: 1

      My only gripe is that it's typically all in 20s.

      That's OK as long as they are used and unmarked.

  2. I trust my credit unions by DogDude · · Score: 5, Informative

    I don't trust (or use) commercial banks. Every one that I've tried has been garbage.

    I have no reason to trust these start-ups, which I'm sure will be sold as soon as they can to big banks and are selling their "customers"' data all the while.

    I'll stick with my trusty, cheap, and very effective local credit unions, thank you.

    --
    I don't respond to AC's.
    1. Re:I trust my credit unions by olsmeister · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Opposite here. I have accounts at both a local CU and a local bank. The CU is OK, but the bank is much better. The tellers know me by name (no idea how they do that, I'm only in there once a month or so) and they have free soda, popcorn, and sometimes hot dogs. They pay me interest on my checking account (CU does not) and I have a free safe deposit box at the bank as well. It's really no contest. The only reason I keep the CU account is because I've had it for 30 years.

    2. Re:I trust my credit unions by fustakrakich · · Score: 1

      You can also trust the post office. Expect more people like these to take pot shots against it.

      --
      “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
    3. Re:I trust my credit unions by DNS-and-BIND · · Score: 1

      The post office has nothing to do with banking. Why not make it so you can pick up your UPS packages at the local porno shop? Or put knitting supplies in fishing tackle stores?

      Honestly as bad as banks are, having a US government bank sounds even worse.

      --
      Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
    4. Re:I trust my credit unions by grasshoppa · · Score: 1

      Plus credit unions are "Buying locally", which helps your immediate area far more than shipping the cash away to somewhere across the country/world.

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    5. Re:I trust my credit unions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      My experience matched yours completely.

      Then I stopped eating the hotdogs.

      Then the mind control drugs wore off.

      And then I realized the Matrix was using me as a battery and a source of cash.

    6. Re:I trust my credit unions by chill · · Score: 2

      You're lumping in National Banks with Community Banks, and they are very different. You might want to take a look at a Community bank in addition to your Credit Union.

      https://ilsr.org/top-5-reasons-choose-community-bank-or-credit-union/

      --
      Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
    7. Re:I trust my credit unions by davidwr · · Score: 1

      You're lumping in National Banks with Community Banks

      A National Bank can be a community bank.

      A National Bank refers to its federal charter, as opposed to a state-chartered bank.

      A community bank is what most of us think of when we think of a small bank that has only 1 branch or maybe a few branches and which focuses on a small geographic community. It can have either a national or state charter.

      --
      Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
    8. Re:I trust my credit unions by shess · · Score: 1

      Opposite here. I have accounts at both a local CU and a local bank. The CU is OK, but the bank is much better. The tellers know me by name (no idea how they do that, I'm only in there once a month or so) and they have free soda, popcorn, and sometimes hot dogs. They pay me interest on my checking account (CU does not) and I have a free safe deposit box at the bank as well. It's really no contest. The only reason I keep the CU account is because I've had it for 30 years.

      Wow. My local banks have interest-bearing checking accounts. They pay up to .05% interest, and charge like $18/mo for the privilege. My credit union charges $0/month and pays %.65 interest on checking, and 1.9% on savings (which has transaction restrictions, but is a great backstop for my checking account). When I audited things, the numbers varied, but the banks varied between conning you out of your money versus outright stealing it, and the credit unions varied from weak to reasonably competitive with online-only banks like Ally.

      I will note that my experience with credit unions is that sometimes it feels like they are a bunch of amateurs WRT their IT systems, whereas banks feel more professional. Which is to say that the credit union sometimes breaks because Chrome moves too fast for them, whereas the banks break because their website uses ALL the third-party libraries (used to be they broke because they'd loop Flash in so they could force their custom authentication system. Gag). So it is kind of a mixed bag on that front.

    9. Re:I trust my credit unions by apoc.famine · · Score: 1

      Ditto here. They call me when they spot likely fraud on a card, and return the money instantly. If I need a new card, I take a 5 min walk from work to the local branch, and they print one on the spot. Their rates are pretty much the same as the banks, and they have no fees for just about anything.

      I've had mixed CU experiences - usually the smaller they are, the more they struggle. Once they get big enough, they tend to have all the bells and whistles that the bigger banks have, with very customer friendly policies. My current one is one of the larger ones in the state, and it's doing pretty much everything right, as far as I can see.

      --
      Velociraptor = Distiraptor / Timeraptor
    10. Re:I trust my credit unions by Actually,+I+do+RTFA · · Score: 1

      I dunno. I've heard that LCUs are better, but looking at their fees and services, etc. it seems that they are on par with the big commcercial banks. Sometimes even worse. Maybe my LCU sucks. Care to put forth some numbers?

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      Your ad here. Ask me how!
    11. Re:I trust my credit unions by DogDude · · Score: 1

      Every credit union is different. I'm a member of four local ones and I move 8 figures worth of money annually through them in one way or another. They have very low fees on regular banking services, great interest rates for borrowing, and they pay a decent amount on savings/money market. One of them is staffed on the phone 24/7, and have tellers available in branches 7:00 AM-7:00 PM 7 days a week. That, and they're non-profits, so I trust them not to try to fuck me over.

      --
      I don't respond to AC's.
    12. Re:I trust my credit unions by chill · · Score: 1

      Yes, thank you, I was sloppy with my definition. Though, as a practical matter, most community banks seem to be State-chartered.

      https://www.csbs.org/state-chartered-banks-state

      And most State-chartered banks are community banks.

      https://www.csbs.org/most-state-chartered-banks-are-community-banks

      --
      Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
    13. Re:I trust my credit unions by CronoCloud · · Score: 2

      The post office has nothing to do with banking.

      Oh my sweet summer child, didn't you read the linked article which mentions how the Post Office offered savings accounts from 1911 to 1967? But what astounds me is that you didn't already know that. Know your history!

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

      Not only that, but in many countries, the Post Offices DO offer banking services.

      So if the USPO was to offer bank services, they'd be returning to their roots. Though I think as part of that they should offer e-mail accounts and SMIME e-mail certs.

      Even in the US, the Post Office still offers money order services.

      Honestly as bad as banks are, having a US government bank sounds even worse.

      For the average joe in the US for many many years, the post office WAS their bank.

    14. Re:I trust my credit unions by Attila+Dimedici · · Score: 1

      IN the U.S. the Community banks are all getting bought out because the cost of complying with Dodd-Frank is too high for small banks.

      --
      The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
    15. Re:I trust my credit unions by DNS-and-BIND · · Score: 1

      Sounds like it was a dumb idea and they stopped doing it. Much like other American attitudes that were in place from 1911 until the 1960s.

      --
      Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
    16. Re:I trust my credit unions by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      The tellers know me by name

      What's a teller? According to Wikipedia it's an employee at a branch that deals with customers. I went down the Wikipedia spiral trying to find out what a bank branch was.

      Do you guy still do this? I think vaguely remember talking to a "teller" back in the early 90s when my parents took me to a bank to open an account. I just looked at my own bank's website. Apparently they have branches and tellers and they charge you $5 if you need to talk to them. I don't know why you would ever talk to them but there you go.

      This conversation is like reading a history book.

    17. Re:I trust my credit unions by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      They stopped doing it because demand dropped. Demand dropped because the post office wasn't allowed to offer OTHER banking services. For example, the interstate highway system and post WW2 affluence meant more travel, which meant that personal checks became useful for the masses. Also mail-order retailers began using no-cash policies and stopping cash-on-delivery, again making personal checks more useful when filling out a Sears/Montgomery Ward/JC Penney order form.

      Also many blue collar people took advantage of the "float" involved with checking accounts, to manage their limited funds. The disappearance of the float has hurt low income people.

      I personally think that the Post Office should get into small personal banking services, to help reduce the percentage of the unbanked and to combat these megacorps trying to pass themselves as "upstart small banks", for example the "upstart" Marcus is Goldman Sachs.

      And again, I think the Post Office is the perfect place to offer SMIME certs.

    18. Re:I trust my credit unions by DNS-and-BIND · · Score: 1

      Have you BEEN to a US post office? They have the customer service skills of the Unabomber.

      --
      Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
    19. Re:I trust my credit unions by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      Why yes, I have been to post offices, never had bad service. Do you go in ranting about collectivists or big government or something? Or did you make up a strawman to promote your usual randroid/alt-right/all-government-is-evil-collectivism rantings.

  3. REVOLUT and N26 in Europe by gDLL · · Score: 1

    Revolut and N26 are geting popularity here in Europe because of ungreedy exchange rates, low/no fees and nice phone apps. Waiting on them to open up investing via app since we don't have robinhood in europe.

  4. Bad troll by DogDude · · Score: 1

    That was a terrible troll. It didn't even make any sense.

    --
    I don't respond to AC's.
    1. Re:Bad troll by chill · · Score: 5, Informative

      Subtle troll. Nice. However, a lying troll you are.

      The Democrats passed a law requiring banks make loans to risky applicants under the name of political correctness.

      I assume you're referring the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977. But that played almost no part in the problem. Many subprime lenders were not subject to the CRA. Research indicates only 6% of high-cost loans - a proxy for subprime loans - had any connection to the law.

      Enter the Obama regime. They decide to give the banks trillions of dollars to cover these bad loans that the Democrats made them give in the first place.

      The Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 was done by Republican George W. Bush. Here's his televised address announcing the bailout.

      Small banks have been steadily declining in numbers since 2000. However, total assets and deposits have grown over that same period.

      Yes, regulations passed in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, notably Dodd-Frank, weigh heavier on small banks. The attempt to standardize or homogenize service offerings runs counter to the small bank model of personalized service and relationship banking. One size fits all regulation is not working and needs changed.

      Firsthand knowledge of customers provides useful information for making sound lending decisions. Credit unions report that delinquent loans peaked in 2009 at 1.82 percent of credit unionsâ(TM) loan portfolios and were down to 1.15 percent at the end of 2012. Community banksâ(TM) loans tend to default at lower rates than loans made by bigger institutions. The rate of loans in default for the first quarter of 2013 on loans secured by residential properties was 3.47 percent for banks with less than $1 billion and 10.42 percent for banks with more than $1 billion in assets. Community banks that are closest to their borrowers may fare best. [Citation: https://www.mercatus.org/system/files/Peirce_BurdensOnSmallBanks_testimony_112613.pdf]

      --
      Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
  5. I've twice lived in the USA by FeelGood314 · · Score: 4, Informative

    The banks in the USA are terrible. They are far worse than any other industrialized country and often banking is easier in third world countries. American's also tend to use cash and checks more than everyone else. My kids don't even carry wallets anymore, I doubt you could do that in the USA. The banks just aren't motivated to be convenient like that.

    Also I'm a white male which makes using financial services much easier. There is a certain class and race rigidity in the USA and the financial system is a big part of it.

    1. Re:I've twice lived in the USA by AmiMoJo · · Score: 2

      "Bank" is actually from the Latin "bastardus". True fact.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    2. Re:I've twice lived in the USA by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 2

      Eh?

      My kids don't even carry wallets anymore, I doubt you could do that in the USA.

      Not sure what you are basing that on ... if you wanted to, you could likely go cashless as easily as anyplace else.

      Also I'm a white male which makes using financial services much easier. There is a certain class and race rigidity in the USA and the financial system is a big part of it.

      relax their standards whenever non-white is in the equation.

    3. Re:I've twice lived in the USA by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Garr, tag soup ... trying again.

      Eh?

      My kids don't even carry wallets anymore, I doubt you could do that in the USA.

      Not sure what you are basing that on ... if you wanted to, you could likely go cashless as easily as anyplace else.

      Also I'm a white male which makes using financial services much easier. There is a certain class and race rigidity in the USA and the financial system is a big part of it.

      What are you talking about? If anything, banks relax their standards whenever non-white is in the equation.

    4. Re:I've twice lived in the USA by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      They are far worse than any other industrialized country

      How could possibly come to a reasonable analysis on that? Do you know how many industrialized countries there are? You didn't say "worse than most industrialized countries." You didn't say, "Worse than my country" or "worse than other countries I've tried," you said "worse than any other industrialized country." This sort of fuzzy language makes it seem like you are also a fuzzy thinker, and it makes it hard to trust your opinion.

      Furthermore your criticism of American banks is that "they make you carry a wallet" and "they are racist." ............What? That's the thing that bothered you most about American banks? Really? It wasn't all the service charges?

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    5. Re:I've twice lived in the USA by cayenne8 · · Score: 1

      American's also tend to use cash and checks more than everyone else. My kids don't even carry wallets anymore, I doubt you could do that in the USA.

      That's odd.

      Why don't you like cash?

      I generally hit the ATM weekly or so, get a few hundred dollars out and my casual, weekly expenses are paid for out of that...it gives a a very solid, real feeling on what all I'm spending my money on that week.

      I have credit cards for things, large purchases, some online purchases sure....but I actually prefer to use cash when I can because it isn't tracked (I prefer not to have my transactions tracked by XYZ corporation or government entity), and like I said, it makes money REAL to me, it isn't abstracted like when you go to a casino and use chips instead of cash. With that abstraction, it is easy to spend a LOT of money you might shouldn't do because it is so abstracted from really money that runs out when you run out of physical cash on hand.

      With a CC, it gets so easy to just swipe and sign and never really even look at the amounts you are charging.

      --
      Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
    6. Re:I've twice lived in the USA by jonwil · · Score: 1

      Here in Australia I was able to walk into a branch of the Bank of Queensland (the bank I currently bank with) and open an account and all I needed was a $1 coin and sufficient ID. In the years I have had that account, I have paid a grand total of $0 in monthly fees and $0 in normal transaction fees.

      The only fees I have paid in that time are for foreign online purchases and in a few cases fees for taking money of an ATM that charged fees (something I only do when one of the thousands of fee-free ATMs I get access to is not available at whatever location I am).

      Oh and if for some bizarre reason I actually needed to deposit or write cheques (I haven't had to deal with a cheque in years and can't remember ever needing to write one) my account doesn't charge any fees for doing that either.

      And I am sure I could do the same thing (open an account with no fees with near zero deposit required) at any number of other Australian banks.

      I will never understand why no-one has been able to come in and offer such accounts in the US (accounts that give people with low amounts of money and low incomes genuine banking access with low or no fees) and put the greedy scumbags at the payday loan/check cashing places (the ones that in many cases are the only real way for low income earners to turn their paychecks into actual spendable cash) out of business.

  6. Not for long by PPH · · Score: 1

    People tried to exit the moribund US banking system after the 2008 crash. Banks responded with legislation to prevent this and drive customers back. Face it. We live behind a financial Iron Curtain. If they could justify shooting you for attempting to exit, they would.

    --
    Have gnu, will travel.
    1. Re:Not for long by DogDude · · Score: 1

      What are you talking about? "Exiting the US banking system"? What does that even mean?

      --
      I don't respond to AC's.
    2. Re:Not for long by PPH · · Score: 1

      It means banking with a foreign bank. Like ING, Deutsche Bank, Toronto Dominion, etc. It's what a lot of businesses did when the US banking system seized up in 2008. Until the US threatened to audit any foreign bank with an American customer until they screamed and cried 'Uncle'.

      --
      Have gnu, will travel.
    3. Re:Not for long by WoTG · · Score: 1

      Not sure how foreign TD is for Americans - they have more branches in the US than Canada now! Not sure how metrics other than branch counts compare...

  7. It's a trick! by Thelasko · · Score: 5, Informative

    Marcus (Goldman Sachs) and Empower (J.P. Morgan) are really just large megabanks in disguise. Marketing at its finest!

    --
    One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
    1. Re:It's a trick! by SeaFox · · Score: 1

      Marcus (Goldman Sachs) and Empower (J.P. Morgan) are really just large megabanks in disguise. Marketing at its finest!

      Marcus:

        - In Google Search results "Marcus by Goldman Sachs"
        - On the home page right under the name: "by Goldman Sachs"
        - Security Cert indicator on Firefox before the URL: "Goldman Sachs Bank USA (US)"

      I don't see any attempt at deception there.

    2. Re:It's a trick! by Thelasko · · Score: 1

      Are you sure about Empower? It looks like Empower Retirement is related to J.P. Morgan, but I can't find anything linking Empower Finance listed here with JP Morgan - it does actually look like a new startup to me.

      Wikipedia

      Empower was created in 2014 when Great-West Life combined the record keeping services of Great-West Financial, JPMorgan Chase, and Putnam Investments.

      I used to have a JP Morgan account that is now an Empower account.

      --
      One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
  8. Expect high fees by davidwr · · Score: 1

    "Narrow banking" - where "liquid no-risk cash" accounts cannot be used to back loans - can work on a small scale but credit unions still need to cover their costs and for-profit banks still need to make a buck.

    So, either they charge for this service, or they find some other way to make money off of customers, such as selling their personal data, sending them pad ads from third parties, or advertising their other money-making services in hopes that customers will buy enough to cover the loss from the "deposit money with us so we can loan it out" model.

    On a large scale, it creates another problem:

    Cash in such an account is like cash in a piggy bank: It's not available for others it use. Granted, this is the intent, but it will mean that the "useful money supply" will go down and interest rates will go up, or the fed or other central banks will have to take other steps to increase the "useful money supply." This isn't a deal-breaker but it is something that has to be thought through.

    Personally, I'm fine with the rules we've lived in since the 1930s, which allow lending with small-ish reserve requirements but insurance of the first $X to cover bank failures, where $X is several years' income for the average American household. I'm fine with it as long as a responsibly-used (balance is always more than a reasonably small minimum amount) checking account not only free but earning me interest.

    --
    Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
  9. Americans use cash?? ... Never been to Germany? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I don't know what USA you've been to, but the one I've seen is dominated by debt ... err I mean "credit" cards.

    And on what planet is using actual cash instead of imaginary debt for the low low price of total totalitarian surveillance of your finances a good thing?

    In Germany we have a saying: "Nur Bares ist Wahres." (Loosely translated: Only cash is true/real.)

    Here, you can't even use cards at many places. And the majority of us make sure you never will.

    I'm also certain, that the only reason we're using fiat money is, that basically everything is fiat/relative, including the worth of gold etc, and we have no way yet, to measure real-world work in a standardized way.

    Our banks suck too though. As you, by law, require somebody who managed a bank for 10 years to manage your bank, to even be able to found a new one. Guaranteeing that the same old cancerous culture and old boys club carries over for ever. Not that the state agency responsible would not reject any new request for a bank license anyway. Duh, with it being made up of people from the old banks.
    That's why we still have bank transfers that take not seconds... not even minutes... but DAYS. ... Complete madness, when you know that they did lay entirely new fiber cables across the Atlantic, just to shave off 20 milliseconds(!)) from their high-frequency trading delays. (Before just moving the servers themselves across.)

  10. What I'd like to see... by Kokuyo · · Score: 1

    I don't know whether my thoughts apply here since I live in Switzerland but...

    The two primary things I'd want is the ability to pay normal bills with my credit card so I probably wouldn't even need a bank account and would collect frequent flyer miles on top of it :D.

    On a more serious note, I'd love it if I could use the principle of compounded interest FOR me instead of having it wielded against me for once. I'd like to be able to pay a fixed amont of money to the bank on my mortgage each month. The bank takes what it's due for interest and the rest goes to amortization.

    That way, the amount I was paying back would grow each month. Slowly but steadily. I could pay off my mortgage of about half a million by the time I'm 56 without even having to spare it any thought.

    As it stands the banks keep wanting to have me amortize indirectly (I don't know whether that's a thing in the US at all...) which basically means paying into a retirement fund (which only gives .7%interest while I'm paying 1.2% on the mortgage) which I basically pawn off to the bank.

    The idea behind that is to save taxes. And you do! You save easily ten percent in taxes of what you pay in mortgage interest.

    Switzerland is the country where the myth that you have to have some debts in order for the state to not smother you with taxes is alive and kicking in no small part due to the fact that the banks gladly feed it at every turn. Like pigeons in Venice... and it produces about as much crap on society, too.

    1. Re:What I'd like to see... by Actually,+I+do+RTFA · · Score: 1

      I'd like to be able to pay a fixed amont of money to the bank on my mortgage each month. The bank takes what it's due for interest and the rest goes to amortization.

      Isn't this what a mortgage payment is? At least in the US. It's why most people are underwater on their mortgage until like year 5 or 10... cause at the beginning 90% of your payment is interest, and it slowly decreases.

      That said, 1.2% is pretty darn good. Heck, you can probably find a safe investment that pays more than that.

      You save easily ten percent in taxes of what you pay in mortgage interest

      While that's true, you do pay 100% of the mortgage interest. To my mind, that's 900% more.

      --
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  11. Credit Union and Bank by DERoss · · Score: 1

    I have accounts at both a major, nation-wide credit union and a not-so-large regional bank. I pay NO fees to either financial institution.

    Most of my "banking" is with the credit union, including my credit card. Through the Co-Op Network of credit unions, I can get cash without any fee from ATMs at most other credit unions as well as at a local drug store and a nearby convenience grocery. I can actually go into some credit unions where I do not have an account and make a deposit to the credit union where I have my account. This is through the Service Center network of credit unions. (Picture going into Wells Fargo to make a deposit to a Bank of America account.)

    I write checks against my account at the real bank when I think I might need the cancelled check in the future. That is because a federal law prohibits credit unions from returning cancelled checks. (Instead of the checks, my real bank sends a page with images of the front and back of each cancelled check with my monthly statement.) Another service provided by my real bank that I have not seen at any credit union is that I have rented a safe deposit box. For that reason, I chose a bank that is nearby. The box is larger but costs less than the box I used to have at Wells Fargo. Do any Neo-Banks have physical offices nearby with physical safe deposit boxes?

    1. Re:Credit Union and Bank by j-beda · · Score: 1

      Back in the 1990s I think we had a safe deposit box at the local credit union. Here is a credit union that lists safe deposit boxes: https://uoficreditunion.org/ba... though I have no idea how common it might be.

  12. You Don't Need a "Neo-Bank" by crunchygranola · · Score: 1

    I "moved my money" out of big banks (BOA to be specific) and just use a credit union. Better service, better rates, lower fees.

    --
    Second class citizen of the New Gilded Age
  13. Tried this before by edi_guy · · Score: 1
    When ING Direct first came out years ago I jumped on board. Even back then I didn't ever have a need to go into a brick and mortar bank, didn't do a ton of ATM withdrawls.. More importantly they offered a savings rate that was almost 2% over the going rate at the banks and CU's.

    However that higher rate narrowed over time to be about equal and for some special promotion I jumped ship to one of the mega banks. I will say this, the big banks do a very good job with the apps and online stuff now. Checking is free, etc etc.

    These alt banks will only win my business if their rates are much, much better. They might sweep up customers who have issues with budgets, overdrafts and stuff like that. The Mega banks are nearly criminal around that sort of thing, but that's not anything I need to deal with.

  14. Re:Of course customers stayed with the big banks by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    The Democrats and Obama specifically declared them "too big to fail" and shoveled money at them to prop them up.

    The "bailout" was passed in 2008 BEFORE Obama took office in January of 2009

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    The problem was Corporatists and Rightists and Rabid Randroids at the Big Banks distorting the economy.

  15. Re:No payment in money above 3000 euros in Portuga by cheesybagel · · Score: 1

    If you think that is bad you have to read about India's e-currency initiatives under Modi as President. 1984 here we come.