Fintech Insider Podcast by 11:FS
00:41:39 · Benjamin Ensor
[00:41:39] S0: I really like Kate's point and you're kind of driving at the same thing about this, how easy it is to discover people within it is gonna be a crucial thing, right? Does it become a community that makes it easier to find new, interesting people, people you don't know, companies you don't know, or does it just take you back to the same big names and sort of kind of not achieve that goal? And that's really, really tough. And the economics of the media industry are not easy, right? So all credit to Money twenty twenty because it's tough to make media businesses work when there's so much free content out there. Okay. Well, let's move on then to our next story, which is that Marketa is launching a credit card platform. So Marketa is hoping that this new credit card issuing platform, which supports any card type and format will help to establish the company as a complete embedded finance solution. According to Marketa, brands can now embed a credit card into their own digital experience, allowing them to increase overall customer engagement with their product. The Marketa platform will allow brands to tailor products and credit offerings to the needs of their customers. And by harnessing real time data, brands can access insights, set spending controls and generate new cards instantly. The new technology is the result of Marketa's acquisition of Power Finance in January 2023. Before I bring in the panel, we contacted Marketa, whose Vice President of Product, Randy Fernando, had this to say.
00:43:12 · Randy Fernando, Benjamin Ensor
[00:43:12] S7: Earlier this week, we announced the launch of Marketa's new credit platform. And why we're so excited about that announcement is because it's been really the work of many members of the Marketa team over the last nine plus months. Back in February, my company, Power Finance, was acquired by Marketa. And today, with this announcement, we're able to deliver a few key components that we think are really going to change the game for folks looking to issue their own white labeled embedded credit card experience. Number one, the new credit platform is an end to end credit issues platform. Meaning, we provide issuing, processing, as well as full program management capabilities. Number two, we have a robust loyalty and rewards engine powering points, statement credit, and cashback. Lastly, powered by our low code UI templates, these experiences are completely embedded within the brand's digital properties. Meaning, our clients are able to embed every aspect from the application flow to card management directly within their existing digital apps. Really excited about the future and to see how creative our customers will get as they reimagine what it means to issue their own credit cards. [00:44:36] S0: So, Pranav, I might throw this one to you. Who is this who's this interesting for, do you think? I mean, who are the who are the brands who might want to issue credit cards? What sorts of companies might be interested in something like this?
00:44:36 · Benjamin Ensor, Pranav Sood
[00:44:36] S0: So, Pranav, I might throw this one to you. Who is this who's this interesting for, do you think? I mean, who are the who are the brands who might want to issue credit cards? What sorts of companies might be interested in something like this? [00:44:51] S3: I mean, look, the the growth of embedded finance has been not particularly discriminatory in terms of which which which platforms or or or verticals it targets. I don't know. We we were talking about this earlier, but we actually just released a new report this week talking about just how much untapped the demand there is for platforms to offer embedded finance solutions. So I see a huge opportunity for SaaS platforms to do this when you think about embedded, you know, wallets and and the kinds of things that they want to offer, their their users. I see opportunities potentially for, you know, retail businesses to do it. As as as Marquetta talks about, they've they've come up with quite a smart link with rewards as well that will be able to integrate into a single offering. And generally, I think there's there's a lot of opportunity to to do, embedded, credit products around the world. So I I don't know if I have a smart answer about one particular customer. I just think that it's symptomatic of the larger trend towards embedded finance across the software and kind of adjacent industries.
00:44:51 · Pranav Sood, Benjamin Ensor
[00:44:51] S3: I mean, look, the the growth of embedded finance has been not particularly discriminatory in terms of which which which platforms or or or verticals it targets. I don't know. We we were talking about this earlier, but we actually just released a new report this week talking about just how much untapped the demand there is for platforms to offer embedded finance solutions. So I see a huge opportunity for SaaS platforms to do this when you think about embedded, you know, wallets and and the kinds of things that they want to offer, their their users. I see opportunities potentially for, you know, retail businesses to do it. As as as Marquetta talks about, they've they've come up with quite a smart link with rewards as well that will be able to integrate into a single offering. And generally, I think there's there's a lot of opportunity to to do, embedded, credit products around the world. So I I don't know if I have a smart answer about one particular customer. I just think that it's symptomatic of the larger trend towards embedded finance across the software and kind of adjacent industries. [00:45:54] S0: Yeah, no, I definitely agree. Kate, if Marques' vision comes to fruition, every single company all of us deal with will be offering us a credit card. Is that a good thing for customers? I mean, what are the risks here involved in particularly credit card, particularly offering sort of credit cards to customers?
00:46:13 · Kate Moody
[00:46:13] S2: Yeah, I can't say that a future where we're just inundated with credit cards fills me with hope and joy and warm fuzzy feelings. I mean, I think it's, I'm interested to know which markets they want to push this in first, because I think credit cards is definitely one of the products where we see the most variation in terms of like basic kind of financial products. You see huge variation in customer engagement with an appetite for credit cards. You know, a good friend of mine who's just moved back to The UK recently after working on a FinTech kind of proposition in The US, which is quite anchored around a credit card offering, kind of messaged me saying, you know, Oh crap, nobody in The UK really wants credit cards. So, you know, think it's, it'll be interesting to see which markets they focus on first. And, you know, we know that there is a real benefit for customers in sort of compartmentalising spend to some degree. And we see people doing that through using, you know, particular cards for particular mental categories of spend or kind of finding it useful to split. But having a credit card for every single category of spend, I think, would be massively overwhelming unless we've moved to a future where you've got the likes of Curve or people like that, that are kind of consolidating all of these cards into one place. So, yeah, I'm intrigued, but a little bit sort of perplexed, I suppose, about how they see this playing out in the long term, kind of what their big vision is. Yeah.
00:47:38 · Pranav Sood
[00:47:38] S3: I think they're still quite early on the journey of rolling this product out. From what I've heard, the number of customers using it is still relatively small. The one thing I would say, Kate, to your point is that we have to believe that there are platforms out there who understand the needs of their customers better than traditional banks do. And so if you can find a way to use the data that you have on transactional behavior or usage to offer contextual credit, to offer things that are relevant, to offer things that are, you know, hopefully also very price competitive, then you've gotta hope that that's a that's a good thing and and hopefully a better one than than sticking with the status quo.