Varo Money, a mobile-only startup that focuses on financial health, announced Monday it has raised more than $27 million. The global private equity firm Warburg Pincus led the round.
Like many other financial health mobile apps, Varo plans to help consumers achieve better financial outcomes. The San Francisco startup said it plans to partner with a bank and provide customers with deposit and lending products and a debit card. These products will connect to a
Interestingly, Varo says it will also provide access to and integration with popular finance apps through an in-app marketplace – a strategy that a cadre of
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A growing number of startups and banks are trying to design digital experiences that train users to manage their money more responsibly, starting with small amounts in mundane situations.
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Ally Financial has launched a mobile app that uses geolocation to caution smartphone-carrying customers when they are arriving at stores where they overspend.
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On October 1, USAA introduced a new kind of measurement for members: a financial readiness score and advice to improve it. The newest digital feature, which requires members to answer survey questions, represents a nascent trend of companies hoping to compete on the digital financial health battlefront.
October 9 -
Digit, a startup in San Francisco targeting millennials, has launched a service that crunches checking account data to determine daily amounts to automatically transfer into users' savings accounts. Its debut points to how personal financial management services are growing up to do the work on the consumer's behalf.
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Colin Walsh, who previously served as chief executive of American Express in the U.K., is a Varo co-founder and its chief executive.
“The U.S. banking market is undergoing a huge transformation, and Varo is ideally positioned to offer a unique and unrivalled banking service to our target customer base,” said Walsh in a press release.
Varo will begin live-testing with customers later this year.
