This interview was originally featured in "Industry Insights: The World’s Fast-Growing Ecommerce Market, Part One" as part of a curated collection of interviews among executives in Latin America, conducted by eMarketer, in partnership with VTEX, an ecommerce and marketplace platform. Download your complimentary copy today!
How are fintech companies working to help close the divide between banked and unbanked consumers and democratize access to the digital economy in Brazil?
Many consumers from Brazil’s lower socioeconomic classes do not have access to or cannot afford traditional banking services. The rise of fintech companies has helped revolutionize Brazil’s banking sector over the past six years by offering unbanked, or underbanked, consumers the ability to access financial services, all from within a single mobile app.
Everyone needs a bank, but we believe that consumers should not have to pay for a checking account. In order to attract new clients, our strategy has centered on offering one of Brazil’s first 100% free-of-charge digital checking accounts. This means that we do not charge any annuity to cardholders, nor do we charge fees for ATM withdrawals or wire transfers. In doing so, consumers can now be treated equally and purchase both financial and nonfinancial products.
We currently have more than 10 million clients and are opening approximately 38,000 new bank accounts every day. This is a truly remarkable social accomplishment that Banco Inter has done. And with our digital marketplace, we are quickly becoming a one-stop-shop for consumers.
What made Banco Inter decide to expand into the world of ecommerce? What opportunities are you observing within the Brazilian market?
No other institution knows more about their clients than banks do. We know who they are, what they spend, how they consume—everything. So, the next logical step for us was to leverage our audience as a marketplace. In our view, companies that can provide people with broader and more transparent access to credit and financial services— all while understanding the entire consumer lifecycle—will be the biggest winners of ecommerce.
We first started by competing with Google and Facebook, as an advertising environment, where retailers could come in, reach an interesting audience, and segment said audience. In exchange, they would not just get a lead but a completed purchase.
Financially speaking, that is the opportunity we see for ecommerce—for us as a company and for our customer base. Since our audience is what attracts retailers to our marketplace, it is only fair that we share part of our profits with them in the form of cashback.