Founded in 2015, Tandem Bank used to be among the ranks of U.K. challenger banks Monzo and Starling. But Tandem Bank has remained relatively quiet for the past year-and-a-half– seemingly sidelined from the digital banking race taking place across the globe.

That’s changing today, however. Tandem Bank announced it has acquired lending platform Oplo. Financial details about the deal were undisclosed.

“I think this is a really exciting business combination,” said Tandem Bank Group CEO Susie Aliker. “We have a shared and common purpose to create a greener and fairer banking proposition. We want to build on our digital and technology capabilities to really create a really exciting but also profitable challenger bank.”

Oplo was founded in 2004 and has since lent over $1.2 billion (£900 million) to mainstream customers. The U.K.-based fintech offers car finance, personal loans, and secured loan products as alternatives to traditional bank loans. When it combines with Tandem, the digital bank will have $1.64 billion (£1.2 billion) in assets.

Tandem is very focused on the ESG initiative that has been sweeping the fintech industry; this includes digital banking players in particular. Tandem Bank currently holds $315 million (£230 million) in its Green Loans, a product that helps accountholders “save the planet whilst saving money.” Last year, the digital bank provided customers with loans for home improvements that contributed to over 12,000 tonnes of CO2 reductions.

The Green Loans product comes courtesy of Tandem Bank’s 2020 acquisition of Allium Money, an alternative lender that offers consumers financing to improve the energy efficiency of their homes.

“By joining forces, we will be able to offer a wider range of products and higher quality of service to more people than ever before,” Oplo said in a blog post announcing the change. “And together, as Tandem, we will build a fairer and greener bank for all.”

In a video, Aliker described the company’s recent shift to double-down on its ESG focus. “Our target market going forward will be what we call The New Mainstream.” We want to give them the choices so that they can also help contribute towards a fairer and greener future.”

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Rocket Companies, the parent company of tech-driven real estate, mortgage, and financial services businesses, acquired personal finance app TrueBill today. The deal is expected to close by the end of the year for $1.28 billion in cash.

“We are very impressed with what Truebill has created – providing a simple, intuitive client experience to help its users save significant money,” said Rocket Companies CEO Jay Farner. “The company is a perfect fit for the Rocket platform. Truebill’s work helping Americans keep track of their finances and providing guidance that leads to better financial outcomes follows the same philosophy as Rocket Companies – leveraging the power of technology to remove the friction from complex transactions – and applies it to everyday life.”

Founded in 2015, TrueBill helps its 2.5 million members manage subscriptions, improve credit scores, track spending and renegotiate bills. The company analyzes $50 billion in transactions each month and has saved consumers a total of $100 million.

For Rocket Companies, the purchase will push the subsidiaries toward their goal of creating a centralized destination for consumers to manage their entire financial lives. Rocket Companies will also benefit from Truebill’s recurring revenue, which is on track to generate $100 million each year. This figure is more than double the annual revenue the company generated in 2020.

As for its own operations, Rocket Companies generates $1.3 billion each year from the monthly payments made by the organization’s 2.5 million clients for mortgage servicing.

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Ohio-based KeyBank made its sixth acquisition today. The bank purchased Banking-as-a-Service company XUP, a platform that helps banks take control of the merchant experience. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Founded in 2018, XUP connects merchants, third party financial service providers, and acquirers across channels to help banks offer a more integrated and seamless payments experience. KeyBank will use XUP’s technology to improve its embedded banking strategy and improve the user experience for its commercial users. The bank describes the move as the “next step in providing digital innovation at scale.”

Today’s news is only the latest development in the relationship between KeyBank and XUP. The bank contributed to XUP’s $3 million Seed round closed in February and the two were strategic partners. According to KeyBank, XUP helped accelerate the volume growth of its merchant payments capabilities. The bank now counts 150 million card transactions each year, accounting for $13.6 billion in annual card volume.

“We’ve long embraced the software innovation that’s sweeping through the financial services industry, and the acquisition of XUP allows us to continue to be a leader in this space,” said KeyBank’s Head of Enterprise Payments & Analytics Ken Gavrity. “XUP’s highly experienced team has accelerated us on the journey to build connectivity across our systems, our partners, and our customers, to make it easy to do business with Key.”

XUP will continue to operate as its own entity and support its customer base. “Our end-to-end software solutions, combined with Key’s scale and deep financial services expertise, will perfectly blend to provide clients a best-in-class payment experience,” said XUP President Chris May.

KeyBank was founded in 1825, has $187 billion in assets under management, is headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio, and has 1,000 branches across the U.S. The bank’s other acquisitions include AQN Strategies, Finovate alum HelloWallet, First Niagara Financial Group, EverTrust Financial Group, and Leasetec. Among the company’s strategic partners are AvidXchange, BillTrust, and Bill.com.

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MoneyLion made a move today that will help it catch the eye of prospective customers and retain its existing ones. The digital bank acquired MALKA, a creator network and content platform, to help it better engage with consumers and connect with communities.

MALKA was founded in 2012 and works with creators to develop content across digital mediums including advertising campaigns, original branded content, e-gaming livestreams, podcast series, feature length documentaries, sports representation, and marketing. One of MALKA’s differentiating factors is that it maintains a talent base of 170 employees in-house in order to maintain relationships instead of working with different freelancers on different projects.

MALKA will help MoneyLion, which already offers MoneyLife content, in its mission to become a daily destination by bringing evergreen content to educate, inform, and support customers’ financial decisions. Ultimately, integrating MALKA’s content into MoneyLion will support the digital bank’s marketing and brand-building efforts.

“Through this acquisition, which we anticipate will be accretive and cash flow positive in 2022,” said MoneyLion Co-Founder and CEO Dee Choubey, “we will now be able to fully leverage MALKA’s capabilities so that the MoneyLion brand can truly live wherever our customers are investing their attention.” CMO Bill Davaris added, “This fundamental shift will allow us to own and not rent the relationships we are cultivating with new and existing MoneyLion customers.”

At face value, a tie-up between a digital bank and a content creation company seems a bit odd. The acquisition, however, can be seen as MoneyLion simply buying its own creative marketing and content department. No matter how you look at it, the acquisition is a hat tip to the new creator economy and speaks to how content-driven today’s consumers are.

MALKA will operate independently from MoneyLion and the company’s Founder and CEO Louis Krubich and Co-Founder and President Jeff Frommer will continue to lead daily operations. “This partnership will allow us to exponentially grow our creator network and engage with millions of more fans,” said Krubich.

MoneyLion launched in 2013 and offers a full-service platform that delivers mobile banking, lending, and investment solutions. Earlier this year the company teamed up with Zero Hash to launch the ability for users to buy, sell, and hold cryptocurrencies. The company went public on the New York Stock Exchange in September via a SPAC merger with Fusion Acquisition Corporation.

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BM Technologies (formerly known as Bank Mobile) has agreed to merge with Seattle-based community lender First Sound Bank for $23 million. The combined entity will be called BMTX Bank and will serve customers across the country digitally while maintaining a community banking division that will continue serving customers in the greater Seattle market.

“This is a thrilling milestone for BM Technologies and is a major step forward in executing our vision to create a disruptive FinTech bank that combines the best of financial technology with a strong and compliant FDIC-insured institution,” BM Technologies, Chair, Founder, and CEO Luvleen Sidhu said.

BMTX will pay up to $7.22 in cash for each share of First Sound Bank common stock, which amounts to approximately $23 million. Subject to regulatory approvals and customary closing conditions, the strategic merger is slated to close in the second half of 2022. The deal is expected to add significantly to the combined company’s revenue, EBITDA, and earnings trajectory over the next one to three years. Sidhu said that the strategic merger will enable BMTX Bank to offer a variety of new services including direct to consumer and small business operations, marketplace lending, robo-advisory, and blockchain-based payment systems.

“As one of the largest digital banking platforms in the country with approximately 2 million accounts, this merger allows BMTX to lead a new wave of financial innovation by enhancing its focus on technology, inclusion, easy-to-use products, and customer education with the mission of creating ‘customers for life,'” Sidhu explained.

Sidhu will serve as Chair and CEO of BMTX Bank, and will be directly responsible for digital banking initiatives. First Sound Bank President and CEO Marty Steele will serve as COO of BMTX Bank and will lead the company’s community banking division.

“As a local bank, we remain committed to our community and are excited about the opportunity to leverage BMTX’s innovative digital banking technology, Banking-as-a-Service business model, low-cost deposit funding, and better access to the capital markets in order to scale our SBA, commercial and private banking, mortgage, and other business lines,” Steele said.

Founded in 2004 with the largest initial capital base of any de novo bank in the Pacific Northwest at the time, First Sound Bank provides commercial banking services for SMEs, not-for-profit organizations, entrepreneurs, and professional service firms in the Puget Sound region. Headquartered in Seattle, Washington, First Sound Bank has approximately $150 million in assets.

Formerly known as Bank Mobile, BM Technologies was launched in 2015 with a goal of providing a simple, affordable, and financially empowering, digital-first banking experience. The company went public via SPAC at the beginning of the year, listing on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker BMTX. BM Technologies currently has a market capitalization of $145 million.

The company’s strategic merger announcement comes on the heels of BM Technologies’ Q3 results. Among the quarter’s highlights, BM Technologies reported that serviced deposits topped $2 billion for the first time. The company also earned recognition in the 2021 Finovate Awards in September, winning Best Fintech Partnership courtesy of its collaboration with T-Mobile.

To learn more about BM Technologies, check out our Fireside Chat with Luvleen Sidhu from FinovateFall 2021 in New York.

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