Lead Bank diversifying beyond interest income

This shift shows Lead Bank is becoming a fintech infrastructure bank, not just a spread lender. In plain terms, more of its revenue now comes from charging partners to move money, issue cards, and run banking products through Lead’s rails, instead of mainly earning the gap between deposit costs and loan yields. That matters because fee revenue is tied to customer activity and product breadth, not only rates and balance sheet size.1 2 3

• Lead’s product stack lets fintechs open FDIC insured accounts, send ACH, RTP, and Fedwire payments, originate loans, and issue debit or virtual cards through one bank partner. Those workflows create non interest revenue from per transaction fees and interchange splits alongside lending income.2
• The mix shift also marks a move toward the model used by stronger BaaS platforms, where revenue comes from many small software like tolls across accounts, payments, and cards. In the broader BaaS market, interchange, account fees, and subscriptions are the core fee streams beyond interest income.3
• Lead still differs from Column in where the mix starts. As of 2024, Lead was still more interest heavy, at about 68% interest revenue, while Column was closer to an even split. So the rise in non interest income signals convergence toward a more balanced infrastructure bank model, not a complete transition away from lending.2

The next leg is likely more revenue from payments, cards, and program management as larger partners route more activity through Lead. If that happens, Lead looks less like a community bank with a fintech side business and more like a regulated API platform, with a revenue mix that should keep moving closer to the best scaled infrastructure banks.1 2 3