Visa vs. Mastercard: Who had a stronger quarter?

10-Q, Member Exclusive

U.S. Bank is building its small business relationship around the way owners run their businesses

• U.S. Bank is using its new Business Essentials cards to deepen its small business relationship, tying rewards to deposits while connecting spending with broader financial workflows.
• The overarching strategy is to pull more fragmented small business activity – from expenses and payroll to payments and cash flow – into one banking relationship.

Business of Fintech, Member Exclusive, Opinion

Fintech is in its empire-building era

• Fintechs are moving from unbundling banking to owning more of the infrastructure, licenses, and customer relationships around their businesses.
• Chime, Revolut, and Zilch show how scale is pushing fintechs into expansion, M&A, and greater control over everything surrounding their product suite.

Banking, Member Exclusive

The different ways banks are trying to own more of the financial relationship

• Banks are finding new ways to deepen customer relationships, from Live Oak’s industry specialization and Stifel’s relationship-led venture banking to SoFi’s stablecoin settlement and Nubank’s push into banking infrastructure.
• The common thread is owning a piece of the financial relationship that is hard to displace, whether through expertise, relationships, infrastructure, or regulated banking rails.

Member Exclusive, New banks, Podcasts

Nubank’s Ethan Eismann: ‘You have to love your customers fanatically for them to love you fanatically’

• Nubank launched Nu Global and a dedicated U.S. product this month, its first consumer launch outside Brazil, Mexico, and Colombia.
• Chief Design Officer Ethan Eismann explains why he believes trust in banking is built through app performance and care, not just aesthetics.

5 questions, Artificial Intelligence, Member Exclusive

SoFi is asking what financial planning should look like in the AI era

• SoFi Coach keeps members' long-term goals in view as they make everyday decisions about spending, saving, and debt.
• The AI-powered guide widens the window for financial guidance and helps turn advice into concrete next steps, while human planners remain important for complex, high-stakes, and deeply personal decisions.