Connector Supply Not Brand Count

The real bottleneck in bank data aggregation is connector supply, not brand count. In practice, many aggregators keep their own integrations only for the biggest banks, then license the long tail from the same underlying provider, so adding a second aggregator often changes routing and backup coverage more than it truly expands institution coverage. That is why support still gets thin at fintechs like Venmo or Revolut, where fewer shared connectors exist.

• Tony Xiao describes a market where Plaid may have built only a fraction of its claimed institution coverage itself, while the rest comes from other aggregators or outsourced infrastructure. He also says the major players usually maintain their top 10 to 100 connections directly and source the rest elsewhere.
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• The broader market pattern matches that view. The Plaid market analysis notes that Plaid, Yodlee, Finicity, and MX tend to build proprietary connections only for the top roughly 500 banks, while outsourcing or reselling coverage for the long tail. Stripe entered by wrapping other providers rather than building its own full bank coverage stack.
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• For fintech apps, this means two aggregators do not equal twice the banks. Multi aggregator setups are mainly about reducing lock in, retrying failed links, and filling a few specific gaps. Teams still spend 20% to 30% of engineering time on multiplexing and custom fixes, especially when they need nonbank endpoints like Venmo or niche international institutions.
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Going forward, the advantage shifts away from who can list the most banks and toward who can own the best direct connections, the cleanest user flow, and the most useful data on top. As open banking APIs spread, shared raw coverage becomes even more commoditized, and value moves into routing, enrichment, and specialized support for newer fintech endpoints that the shared connector layer still misses.