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Mountain America Credit Union Launches MoneyDesktop’s My Money Manager PFM

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on April 18, 2013
Categories: MoneyDesktop

Money Desktop, creator of the Bubble Budget PFM, announced today that Mountain America Credit Union launched its My Money Manager PFM solution.

Mountain America launched the solution 6 weeks ago, and has since seen 13% of its active online user base (more than 22,000 members) sign up for the service. It provides the solution to its members for free.

Mountain America selected the PFM solution for its “wow-factor” and multiple benefits:

Presents all financial accounts in one location
Allows members to visualize spending habits
Monitors net worth month-to-month
Helps users manage debt by generating spending reports
Presents data in real-time

The Financial Brand featured the Utah-based company’s Bubble Budgets on its blog today, and noted these stats:

From 2011 to 2012, its number of customers grew almost 80%, recurring monthly revenue increased almost 4.5X

More than 400 FIs have selected MoneyDesktop as their PFM provider

Recently, it signed more than 270 new clients, added 22 tech partners in the fintech industry

To learn more about MoneyDesktop, watch its FinovateFall 2012 demo and come to see its new tech launched at FinovateSpring next month in San Francisco. Get your ticket here.

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Finovate Alumni News– April 18, 2013

By David Penn Posted on April 18, 2013
Categories: Concur, Credit Karma, DeviceFidelity, Nomis Solutions, Pageonce, Palo Alto Software, QuantConnect, Quantopian, TipRanks

Silicon Republic takes a look at TipRanks. Join TipRanks in San Francisco for FinovateSpring in May.

QuantConnect adds crowd sentiment data courtesy of Estimize.com.

DeviceFidelity’s patent portfolio grows with new NFC-based mobile wallet technology.

The Valley Girl Show interviews Pageonce founder and CEO Guy Goldstein.

Palo Alto Software launches LivePlan Scoreboard. Check out the demo at FinovateSpring.

Newfination features Bethy Hardeman, Credit Karma Communications Director, who explains its different services.

Concur App Center to offer cloud-based single sign-on from Ping Identity.

Quantopian integrates data sets from Canadian financial search engine startup, Quandl. See Quantopian’s technology at work at FinovateSpring in May.

Nomis Solutions partners with Recombo, integrates Discretion Manager with Agreement Express.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

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eyeOpen Acquired by Aegon (Transamerica)

By David Penn Posted on April 17, 2013
Categories: eyeOpen

Slap a “SOLD” sign on one of the pioneers of the online mortgage advisor business.

eyeOpen, which launched its solution in February as part of FinovateEurope, announced that it has been acquired by Aegon. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Aegon is a global, multinational insurance, pensions, and asset management corporation. Headquartered in The Hague, Netherlands, the company does business in the United States and Canada as Transamerica.

eyeOpen’s mission to build the “next level of personal finance optimization” so far includes their online mortgage advisor which puts algorithms to work helping consumers manage their personal finances.

The company is also a B2B business that sells data-extensive algorithms and software to banks and insurance companies to improve their own personal financial service offerings to their customers and clients.

eyeOpen was founded on Christmas Eve in 2009. The company, with offices in Amsterdam and San Francisco, has raised €10 million in funding, and has served more than 1 million customers in 2012 through its eyeOpen.nl financial portal.

The company is led by CEO Diederick van Thiel, and counts Aegon Investments among its key financial backers.

To see eyeOpen in action, visit our video demo page for FinovateEurope 2013 here.

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Finovate Alumni News– April 17, 2013

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on April 17, 2013
Categories: ACI Worldwide, Actiance, Braintree, BrightScope, Dwolla, EyeVerify, Kony Solutions, Locaid, TipRanks, Tradeshift, Xero

DHL GBS adopts Tradeshift.

Webmasterchecks drops PayPal and makes Dwolla its exclusive payment service provider.

Mobile World Live considers Braintree’s offline strategy. Come to FinovateSpring to check out its live demo.

Kony Solutions talks to banks about selling shares in a public offering as early as this year.

Xero releases updates that facilitate payroll reporting.

Chicago Tribune takes a look at TipRanks. Join TipRanks in San Francisco in May for FinovateSpring.

Alliance Data Retail Services reports on its geofence pilot program with Locaid.

EyeVerify wins third eyeprint patent for its mobile security technology. See them demo at FinovateSpring.

ACI Worldwide announces latest version of ACI Issuer, a cost-savings solution for card-issuing and account management.

Actiance partners with Symantec to provide integrated compliance, eDiscovery and archiving for social business.

BrightScope brings Nerd’s Eye View publisher Michael Kitces to its advisory board.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

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Chase Delivers Prepaid Liquid Cards Instantly In-Branch

By Jim Bruene Posted on April 16, 2013
Categories: Account opening, Branch Banking, Chase Bank, Prepaid/gift cards

While I’m not a branch banking proponent, most of my experiences have been pleasant. But, I can’t remember a complex transaction or problem resolution that was handled "beyond my expectations." That said, the crew at Chase Bank (Wedgwood), treats us very well and even reads this blog (hi Ben), and that’s saying something.

But the Chase branch did beat expectation this past Saturday. My son was leaving on a school trip that night. I wanted to send him with a prepaid card for unforeseen travel expenses. I had a collection of cards in a drawer that I’d tested over the years. But for a variety of reasons they were all unusable (expired, dormant or just not working).

So, I figured I’d just buy him a throwaway card at Safeway. But I really wanted one that was easy to reload online in case he ran in to a cash jam (note 2). Since there is a Chase branch next to my usual Saturday coffee stop, I dropped by on the off-chance they could issue them on the spot.

I was ~~shocked~~ pleasantly surprised to find out the bank’s relatively new Liquid card was in stock and the opening process took less than 10 minutes, faster than a trip to Safeway. And the card was immediately linked to my online banking where I could transfer funds into the card.

It was the ultimate in convenience: no new passwords to remember, new UI’s to traverse, or complex reloading procedures to figure out. The card does have a $4.95 monthly fee, but with no reloading costs, I think that’s fair (note 1).

Bottom line: While I can’t speak for the overall ROI of the branch on Saturday mornings (I was the only person there during my 10-15 min visit at 9:30 AM April 13), I was a very happy customer, who added another service to my Chase banking relationship, and created positive word of mouth (note 3).

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Notes:
1. After I’d already committed to buying, I found out the monthly fee would be waived based on our business relationship. But that wasn’t part of my purchasing decision.
2. My son has apparently lost the card before I could even publish the blog post. So I will soon be experiencing Chase’s lost card customer service.
3. Disclosure: We do not accept blog advertising or affiliate deals, so this is not a paid endorsement. Chase is a Finovate customer (newsletter, event tickets) like many of the companies mentioned here.

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FinovateSpring 2013 Sneak Peek: Part 2

By David Penn Posted on April 16, 2013
Categories: Allied Payment Network, Encap, FinovateSpring 2013, Green Dot, Gremln, Jemstep, Leaf, LICUOS, Lodo Software, Micronotes, Persint, Prestadero, TSYS

If you missed Part 1 of our FinovateSpring 2013 Sneak Peek, click here to read about some of the innovative companies that will be presenting at our upcoming May event in San Francisco.

To learn more about the show, visit our FinovateSpring 2013 page here. Or if you’re just looking to pick up your tickets to the event, click here.

Part 2 of our Sneak Peek will feature another 12 companies that will be among those demoing on the Finovate stage in San Francisco next month. We’ll have even more companies to show you next week.

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Allied Payment Network: Allied Payment Network’s “Pay-It-Your-Way” strategy is driving mobile bill pay adoption by leveraging technology that consumers are embracing wholeheartedly – clicking, snapping a picture, or speaking.

Features:

Strategic differentiator for FIs
Live and available through multiple reselllers
Easily integrate into any mobile app

Why it’s great: Allied’s PicturePay has set the new standard for simplicity in mobile bill pay, using voice or a smartphone’s camera.

Encap: Provides a banking-grade, software-based authentication solution that offers uncompromising speed, security, and simplicity to boost

the adoption of financial services and applications.

Features:

2- and 3-factor authentication that helps drive customer adoption
Seamless integration into apps
Lower cost of ownership

Why it’s great: Most 2- and 3-factor authentication solutions will make your customers hate your product. Integrating Encap will make them love it.

GoBank (by Green Dot Corporation): The first bank account designed from scratch to be opened and used on a mobile device, with deposits insured by the FDIC.

Features:

Real-time alerts
Fast: Join in minutes
Fair: No overdraft fees or minimum balance

Why it’s great: GoBank was created with the user experience top of mind to develop an innovative product with no hidden fees, complete transparency, reliability and peace of mind.

Gremln: Regulatory guidelines make social media compliance difficult for financial services. Gremln provides filtration, approval, and archiving. Teams can work together for secure social media.

Features:

Use social media AND keep your job
Verify posts are compliance before they are live
Multi-tiered approval process

Why it’s great: Your organization’s marketing and compliance forces can work in harmony to create secure, successful social media … all because of Gremln.

Jemstep: Jemstep Portfolio Manager is an online investment advisor that helps people lock in more money for retirement by telling them exactly what to buy and sell.

Features:

All they need to know
Exactly what to do
High-caliber guidance, not high fees

Why it’s great: Jemstep Portfolio Manager is the first and only resource of its kind, and it takes the complexity out of investing.

Licuos: A global B2B payment platform that generates the most efficient A/R and A/P netting, payment and funding proposals for businesses.

Features:

Improves the financial efficiency of businesses
Reduces businesses’s funding needs and credit risk exposure with their clients

Why it’s great: LICUOS allows businesses to reduce their dependence on banks so that they can significantly improve their working capital management.

Leaf: Leaf empowers small business owners to run and grow their businesses by providing a mobile payment platform built for local commerce.

Features:

Accept payments via the processor of your choice
Analyze business performance from any device
Easily engage customers

Why it’s great: LeafPresenter is the first tablet designed specifically for local retail, benefitting small business owners in ways not previously possible.

Lodo Software: D3 Banking uses a powerful, predictive analytics engine and adaptive UI to provide a full range of financial services tailored to customer’s needs anytime, anywhere.

Features:

Consistent customer experience via any digital channel
Customized, automated, targeted marketing
Flexible integration options

Why it’s great: D3 Banking delivers data-driven, digital banking, empowering financial institutions and their customers.

Micronotes: Delivers on the cross-sell imperative for digital banks.

Features:

Most productive digital cross-sell tool
Maximizes $/square inch of digital real estate
Gives interactive a whole new meaning

Why it’s great: Micronotes’s Cross-Sell helps financial institutions radically improve the productivity of cross-selling online to increase revenue.

Persint: Provides consumer analytics, leveraging account aggregation and peer data to answer every household’s financial questions of “where do we stand?” and “what next?”

Features:

120 demographic peers from 5-click survey
Scoring of net worth, cash flow and risk
Opportunity identification & solution mapping

Why it’s great: Persint’s integration of peer data allows PFM to deliver objective conclusions on performance and credible advice on next steps.

Prestadero: The first, fully operational, peer to peer lending platform for the Mexican market.

Feature:

Prestadero is upending traditional savings and loan operations in Mexico, offering loan rates and fixed income returns never before seen in our market.

Why it’s great: Mexico has some of the largest financial spreads in the world. Why? Nobody knows. Prestadero is here to change that.

TSYS: By putting people at the center of every decision we make, TSYS is able to support financial institutions, businesses, and governments in more than 80 countries.

Features:

Remotely control how, when, by whom, and where money is used.
Real-time remote monitoring transactions
Increased risk mitigation

Why it’s great: TSYS is bringing its industry expertise to the exciting and fast-paced area of payments and mobile to show a completely different experience from the end-user perspective.

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For more information on being a part of FinovateSpring 2013, see our FAQ. To register, visit out FinovateSpring page here.

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BancVue to Deploy MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform

By David Penn Posted on April 16, 2013
Categories: BancVue, MicroStrategy

Reporting requirements are about to get a lot less onerous for bank client service managers working with BancVue.

BancVue’s decision to upgrade its business analytics offerings with MicroStrategy’s Business Intelligence platform reflects a desire to enable bank professionals to spend more time on improving customer service and less time with paperwork. The planned deployment of both MicroStrategy’s Business Intelligence and Wisdom Professional solutions will allow FIs to better collect and analyze client data.

BancVue is the company behind Kasasa, a platform that helps financial institutions increase customer loyalty and retention, and allows for marketing on a larger scale and scope. The checking and savings accounts available via Kasasa, for example, provide customers with competitive rates, cash back and personal finance management (PFM) tools that let consumers take more control over their financial lives.

At the same time, they serve as opportunities for community banks and credit unions to market offers and rewards to their clients more efficiently.

MicroStrategy has been in the business of business intelligence since 1989. Headquartered appropriately enough in the intelligence community suburbs of Northern Virginia, the company began providing mobile business intelligence solutions in 2010, and cloud-based, SaaS solutions a year later. Wisdom Professional was brought to market in the summer of 2012.

BancVue demoed its technology as part of the FinovateSpring show in 2011. See them in action here.

MicroStrategy will be joining us in San Francisco for FinovateSpring in May. To learn more about this upcoming event, and to find out how to order your tickets, visit our FinovateSpring page here.

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Allied Payment Network Brings PicturePay to City Bank Texas

By David Penn Posted on April 16, 2013
Categories: Allied Payment Network, Mitek

The agreement between Allied Payment Network and City Bank Texas will put the company’s mobile bill payment service at the disposal of the bank’s customers throughout the Lone Star State.

How does PicturePay work? The app takes advantage of the fact that the average smartphone in 2013 has a high-enough quality resolution to accurately photography the average credit card or utility bill.

Add in the amount to be paid, the date, and the app does the rest. PicturePay pulls the relevant data from the image of the bill, makes sure the biller is the correct one, and then issues the payment through its own network.

A few facts about City Bank of Texas:

The bank has $2 billion in assets
The bank is headquartered in Lubbock, and has 22 branches throughout the state.
Founded in 1941, the bank has more than 500 employees

Interestingly, the technology behind PicturePay, specifically the optical character recognition (OCR) engine, was developed by another Finovate alum, Mitek. Read more about Mitek’s technology here.

Allied Payment Network is one of the companies that will be presenting its technology at FinovateSpring in San Francisco in May. To learn more about the event, including how to buy tickets and save your spot, visit our FinovateSpring information page here.

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Finovate Alumni News– April 16, 2013

By David Penn Posted on April 16, 2013
Categories: Authentify, Boku, Expensify, Experian, Fidor Bank, Jack Henry, Kony Solutions, MiiCard, Mint.com, SeedInvest

Upstart Business Journal features SeedInvest. See them demo at FinovateSpring in San Francisco in May.

Experian announces acquisition of Decisioning Solutions.

Volunteer Federal Savings Bank and Peoples Bank of the South choose Jack Henry Banking for enterprise-wide automation.

GFT Blog interviews Matthias Kroner, chairman of the Fidor management board for Fidor Bank.

Authentify placed in Visionaries quadrant of the Gartner’s “Magic Quadrant for User Authentication.”

Boku partners with Bigpoint SARL and Co to allow users to make virtual payments.

Kony Solutions partners with Blue Shield of CA to develop and deploy apps on the KonyOne Platform.

miiCard adds YubiKey Authentication to online identity proofing solution.

SF Gate lists Mint and Expensify as 2 of 4 services to keep tax records organized.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

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Bid ’em In! Blippy Bunch Announce Live Auction iPhone App

By David Penn Posted on April 15, 2013
Categories: Blippy, Tophatter

Are they hipper than the Home Shopping Network? More engaging than eBay?

Tophatter, the live auction website, has just launched its new iPhone app. The app will provide users with their own avatar and enable them to communicate with each other and the auctioneer.

Tophatter is the latest project and major pivot from the team that brought us transaction-sharing Blippy (Finovate alum, Spring 2010). But whatever Blippy may have missed in its ability to keep users coming back for more, the makers of Tophatter believe they have found in their new “QVC for the social Web” network.

A few early metrics:

More than $1 million dollars in monthly gross transaction volume
35% of first time buyers bought three items in their first month
500,000 bids placed in March, with a sell rate of 80%

The live auction approach of Tophatter reflects CEO Ashvin Kumar and COO Andrew Blachman’s continued investment in “social spending”. In working to promote retention, the team has tried to capture the live experience of the auction with interactivity, while at the same time enriching the virtual experience with a design described by TechCrunch’s Anthony Ha as “loose and cartoony.” In a good way.

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Duke Energy Advertises Savings Account Alternative on NYTimes.com

By Jim Bruene Posted on April 15, 2013
Categories: Advertising & Promotion, Deposits, Checking, Savings, CDs

Above a Paul Krugman Bitcoin commentary on NYTimes.com today, Duke Energy is pitching Premier Notes, a liquid savings account alternative that pays 1.5% for "deposits" of $50,000 or more, 1.3% for $10,000, or 1.1% for less than $10,000 (see screenshot below). Minimum opening amount is $1,000. There is no online application, but you can print a PDF and mail it back with your check.

The timing of the advertisement is no coincidence. March and April are the months when deposit balances swell temporarily with tax refunds.

The Duke Energy rate is pegged at 0.25% higher than the taxable money market average, though that benchmark is essentially zero right now (2 basis points last week). So, it’s hard to know whether this is a promotional rate that could decline to 27 bps in the near future, of if Duke Energy will keep it above the highest bank rates. That will likely depend on how much money they attract.

The notes were introduced in early 2011, and have carried similar rates since for at least the past year. A May 2012 post at DepositAccounts.com lists the top rate at 1.6% and lowest tier at 1.25%. Apparently, GE and Ford offer similar programs. Those two are both paying 1.0% (for $10k) and 1.1% (for $50k+).

Bottom line: Banks have been competing for deposits with non-insured money market vehicles for decades. So, this isn’t a new threat, nor one that you are going to lose sleep over. But it could become a material issue if more non-financial companies target the retail saver.

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Duke Energy banner ad in today’s NT Times website (link, 15 April 2013)
Note: Capital One 360 maintains its NYTimes.com presence in the small upper-right-corner logo

Duke Energy Premier Notes landing page (link)

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Note:
1. For more info, see our Online Banking Report (Nov. 2008, subscription) detailing various ways to leverage your online/mobile channel to boost deposits.

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Finovate Alumni News– April 15, 2013

By David Penn Posted on April 15, 2013
Categories: BancVue, Jingit, Kashoo, MicroStrategy, Monitise, QuantConnect, Quantopian, Refundo, SeedInvest, SoMoLend, The Currency Cloud, TipRanks, TransferWise, TSYS, WattzOn, Yodlee, Zopa

Inc42 Magazine features TransferWise.

INTJ Capital compares and contrasts Quantopian and QuantConnect. Join Quantopian in San Francisco for FinovateSpring.

MicroStrategy launches mobile app Usher, e-wallet for digital I.Ds, keys. See them demo at FinovateSpring in May.

Paybefore takes a look at the TSYS‘s acquisition of NetSpend and ponders “prepaid’s end game.”

Jingit introduces cashback offers.

Monitise Group Strategy Director Richard Johnson talks about trends in mobile money.

BancVue chooses MicroStrategy platform for business analytics.

CPA Practice Advisor takes a look at the new, updated iPad app from Kashoo.

This is Money blog looks at Zopa’s growth.

Yodlee awarded 50th patent for financial gadgets.

SoMoLend travels nationwide to teach small businesses & investors about crowdfunding.

Austin Business Journal considers BancVue’s inverted sales pitch.

Newfination hosts SoMoLend CEO, Candace Klein, who explains how the platform’s crowdfunding capability.

Intelligent HQ interviews The Currency Cloud’s CEO, Michael Laven.

Pando Daily profiles crowdfunding pioneers like SeedInvest and SoMoLend. Join SeedInvest in May for FinovateSpring.

The Next Web interviews TipRanks‘s CEO and co-founder Uri Gruenbaun.

Chevron teams up with WattzOn to launch The Capacity Project for sustainable growth.

Refundo launches free iPhone app. Check out Refundo’s live demo at FinovateSpring.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

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