Leading US banks are not just going digital; they are realizing that digital savings and loans alone do not ensure sustained engagement or profitability. These services must connect to the banks' core strengths: trust, scale, and long-term financial relationships.
According to new analysis from the British Business Bank, challenger banks accounted for 60 per cent of SME lending in 2025, unchanged from the previous year. The figure marks only the second time in more than a decade that their market share has not increased, raising questions about whether the post-financial crisis disruption of the SME lending market has reached a plateau.
Launching our UK bank has been a long-term strategic priority for Revolut and marks a significant moment in our journey. The UK is our home market and central to our growth. We look forward to introducing a full suite of banking services to our millions of UK customers, bringing the same innovative experience we already provide across the rest of Europe.
The GENIUS Act was designed to keep stablecoins as payment tools rather than savings products. As a result, it bans issuers from paying interest or yield to stablecoin holders. Community banks argue that a loophole exists because exchanges and affiliated partners can still offer rewards on stablecoin balances, even if the issuer itself does not pay yield. Smaller banks are more concerned than large banks because they rely heavily on local deposits.
For Missouri-based community bank OMB Bank, finding the right fintech partner used to be a slow, manual process. Executive Vice President and Chief of Staff Jessica Sims recalls working from static PDFs of the bank's preferences, followed by endless back-and-forth emails whenever a fintech expressed interest. The process worked, but painfully slowly, and promising opportunities often slipped through the cracks.
If this is enacted-and that's a big if, though part of me hopes it is-we would likely see a significant contraction in industry credit card lending. Credit card issuers simply won't be able to sustain profitability at a 10% rate cap,
The new battleground in banking is intelligent operations and scalable execution. In 2026, banking is about moving money smarter, faster, and with fewer humans in the middle. Across corporate finance and global retail operations, banks are experimenting with technology and operational design in ways that challenge long-held assumptions about scale, speed, and control. Three recent developments exemplify what's happening in money movement: Goldman Sachs deploying AI agents, Truist automating corporate receivables, and Nubank expanding abroad with a lean digital model.
But if you dig deeper into how businesses in this industry are actually approaching AI deployments - if you ask questions like how they are governing their data, how they are ensuring data quality, and how easily are they connecting AI tools directly to data platforms - you'll soon realize that claims about AI adoption in financial services don't always align with reality.
For most of modern finance, one number has quietly dictated who gets ahead and who gets left out: the credit score. It was a breakthrough when it arrived in the 1950s, becoming an elegant shortcut for a complex decision. But shortcuts age. And in a world driven by data, digital behavior, and real-time signals, the score is increasingly misaligned with how people actually live and manage money.
