Executive Summary

Service providers focused on areas like payments, ecommerce, and lending are challenging the financial services sector for its longtime relationships with small businesses. The providers are looking to use their own relationships with those businesses, their practices of tailoring solutions, and their growing financial capabilities as a profitable way to attract small-business clients.

3 KEY QUESTIONS THIS REPORT WILL ANSWER

1. Why are payments service providers moving into financial services, and what industry trends are paving the way for them?
2. Which major US service providers are making the move, what do they offer, and how are they piggybacking on their existing businesses to expand into the financial space?
3. How will the major US players fare, and which other service providers might make their own financial pushes in the years to come?

WHAT’S IN THIS REPORT? In this report, we look at why service providers are moving into financial services, and what approach the top providers are taking. First, we examine how the popularity of service providers and the digitization of financial services are enabling firms to break into this space. Then we profile five major service providers, laying out their offerings and strategies in the space and what the future may hold for their financial initiatives.

KEY STAT: Square estimated that its US seller ecosystem has a market opportunity worth $86 billion as of September 2020, and that financial services, along with its lending operations, account for $17 billion of that value.