Cross River one-stop fintech partner
Anthony Peculic, Head of Cards at Cross River Bank, on building a fintech one-stop shop
Cross River’s edge is that it collapses what used to be a chain of separate vendors into one banking partner. A fintech can use the same provider to open accounts, move money over ACH and wires, issue debit or credit cards, fund loans, and plug those products together, instead of stitching together a sponsor bank, issuer processor, lending partner, and compliance stack. That makes launches faster, makes economics easier to coordinate, and gives Cross River more ways to earn from each customer.
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In practice, this means a customer that starts with card issuing can add deposit accounts, lending, real time payments, and even capital markets support without changing core bank partners. That is why vertically integrated banks like Cross River and Lead sit in a different position from middleware BaaS platforms that mainly broker access to other banks.
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The money stack is also broader than cards alone. BaaS platforms typically monetize through interchange splits, account fees, and subscription fees, while banks like Cross River also earn interest income on loans and deposits. Adding lending to cards and accounts raises wallet share because the same end user balance can drive spending, borrowing, and repayment flows.
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The comparison set has shifted toward other tech forward banks. Lead has become lending heavy, with 68% of 2024 revenue from interest, while Column is more neobank and payments centric. Cross River is the scaled incumbent in this group, with estimated 2024 revenue of $675M, far above Column at $55M and Lead at $180M.
The category is moving toward fuller banking operating systems, not single point APIs. As more fintechs want one partner that can handle accounts, cards, lending, and money movement together, the winners will be the banks that combine charter, compliance, and developer infrastructure in one stack, and then keep expanding into adjacent services around those core flows.