Chime Mobile Bank Lands $70M

This latest round of funding brings the company to over $100 million in total funding to date and values the business at around $500 million.

While traditional banks charged consumers over $34 billion in fees in 2017, Chime offers its customers no monthly fees, no minimum balance fees, no overdraft fees and no international transaction fees. It also boasts a network of around 40,000 free ATMs.

Earlier this year, the company announced it has opened 750,000 accounts since its launch. It generates proceeds via its accompanying debit card, where it earns about 1.5 percent in interchange revenue from Visa.

Chime’s co-founder and CEO, Chris Britt, previously worked at Flycast, was an early comScore employee and spent time at Visa and Green Dot.

“I started this company because Green Dot was really focused on the unbanked and under-banked people who couldn’t get bank accounts because they had bad credit or bad checks – that sort of thing,” explained Britt. “It was really not a full-featured bank account. And so what I wanted to do with this company was create a product that would serve more mainstream consumers – people who actually have accounts at [Bank of America] and Wells Fargo, but just aren’t particularly satisfied with those guys for variety of reasons – probably first and foremost, the way they structure the products are quite punitive.”

Chime plans to use the new funding to expand the business further through marketing, additional hires and new products and features.

“We think the next phase for us is going to be helping our members manage their credit and loans more effectively,” says Britt. “We think we can play a role in providing short-term lines of credit and helping members manage their debt.” However, he declined to share product details on that front.