US Bancorp Eyes Expanding Business Payments Services

U.S. Bancorp executives said the company’s business customers may welcome more payments services — a line of offerings that already is the source of a quarter of the bank’s revenue, Bloomberg reported.

Minneapolis-based U.S. Bank is the company’s fifth largest commercial bank, according to its marketing materials.

In a Thursday (Oct. 14) presentation for analysts, the company stated that of its 1.1 million business clients with revenue below $25 million, only 28% — 308,000 — use payments services.

“With 1.1 million business banking relationships, there is a significant opportunity for us to deepen current relationships and acquire new customers,” one slide stated.

Of all the bank’s active customers, according to the presentation, about 79% bank with digital platforms, up from 76% a year ago and 72% in 2019.

About 80% of third quarter U.S. Bancorp transactions were online, according to the presentation, up from 76% in the comparable quarter in 2020 and 67% in the comparable quarter in 2019.

In a separate slide deck accompanying the earnings release, the bank stated that net income attributable to payment services was $409 million in the third quarter of 2021, about 20% of total income and about 7.5% less in dollars than during the year-ago third quarter.

In August, U.S. Bank announced it would acquire FinTech Bento Technologies, whose main product is Bento for Business.

Read more: US Bank to Buy Debit Card-Based Biz Expense Management Platform Bento Technologies

Bento for Business provides small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) with debit card-based payment and expense management tools. Bento customers transfer funds from their bank account into a Bento account. Money is accessible through a Visa debit card.

U.S. Bancorp Chief Financial Officer Terry Dolan said, per Bloomberg: “If you think about most of the banking industry, they have banking services, but they don’t really have the payments capabilities that U.S. Bank has. We know there’s the opportunity to be able to broaden that relationship, deepen it, make it stronger.”