Flying Under The Radar

Bank Executives Not Aware of Key Fintech Startups

The Chart of the Week is a weekly Visual Capitalist feature on Fridays.

Mid-afternoon single malt scotch. Summers in the Hamptons. Six-digit bills for yacht maintenance. If you thought bankers live in a bubble, you are correct. Today’s chart is even further evidence: banks are unaware of the very products and services that are vying to pull the rug from under them.

Fintech startups such as Square, The Lending Club, Nutmeg, and Betterment are taking the world by storm, but so far bank executives are unaware of their existence. A survey of 110 bank executives, ranging from directors to C-suite management, found that the majority of respondents do not know key fintech startups that are rapidly changing the banking landscape.

First, the benchmark: 92% of execs knew about Paypal, one of the first real fintech companies to exist. Paypal was started in 1998, IPO’d in 2002, and then was subsequently bought out by Ebay for $1.5 billion. Last year, the company moved $228 billion in 26 currencies across more than 190 nations.