Revolut Puts Hand Up for APRA Banking Licence
(31 August 2021 – Australia) The British based fintech has shown its hand with its ambition to compete directly with the Australian Big Four majors after commencing licensing arrangements with the Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority (APRA).
Revolut currently has a banking licence in the European Union and applied for a licence in the United Kingdom in Q1 2021. The group is focusing on delivering its existing product feature set to Australian customers including a prepaid card, linked cash account and automated budgeting tools with access to a range of cryptocurrencies.
The fintech has a customer base of 500,000 SMEs and 16 million retail customers across 35 countries. In Australia, the office has expanded from three staff when it launched locally in 2020 to its current 25. The fintech recently recruited from 86 400 and Citi for two senior additions to its team, including a new Lending Head in Daniel Gosarevski, former Citibank Australia Head of Portfolio Management.
“We’ve engaged with APRA and are intent on filing an application to become an Aussie bank. Our mission is to directly challenge the incumbent banks. They’ve got wide margins. They offer a suboptimal user experience and their business model’s really quite reliant on customer apathy. We want to give value back to consumers where they’ve been underserved for so long, and we want to put Australians back in control of their finances” stated Revolut Australia CEO Matt Baxby.
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