LatAm favors financial operating systems

Low interchange means the card is a customer acquisition tool in LatAm, not the whole business. In Mexico, Colombia, and Brazil, credit interchange is about 0.8% to 0.9%, debit is about 0.4% to 0.5%, and policy rates have been far higher than in the US, so funding card float eats too much of the economics. That is why Kapital uses cards to pull customers into a broader stack of lending, treasury, bill pay, payroll, and software fees.1 2 3

• Kapital monetizes where LatAm unit economics are stronger. It has said about 60% of revenue comes from interest income and 40% from tech revenue such as SaaS, wires, ACH, interchange, and prepaid card funding fees. That mix is the practical result of treating cards as one product inside a wider operating account.1 2
• The product design follows the same logic. US players like Brex and Ramp start from card spend, but Kapital built around the bank account and e invoicing data, so a customer can see receivables, payables, vendor bills, payroll, and loans in one place. Cards only show a slice of spend, while the bank account shows the whole cash flow.1 2
• Low card margins also help explain why multi product expansion is the growth engine. Kapital says customers start with a loan or card hook, then add payments, collections, treasury, and more, driving far higher retention and usage. By 2024, it had layered in stablecoin treasury and cross border payments on top of banking and lending.2 3 4

The likely winners in LatAm B2B fintech will look less like single feature card apps and more like compact financial operating systems. As categories like HR, payroll, contractor payouts, and cross border treasury get bundled into the primary business account, the company that owns day to day cash movement will keep taking a larger share of revenue and workflow.2 3 4