We learned a couple of weeks back that the former head of Marcus, Swati Bhatia, had taken a job at Santander to lead U.S. consumer and business banking.
Yesterday, we learned more details about what this new job is going to entail.
Santander announced that it will bring its European digital bank, Openbank, to the U.S. and Mexico with an anticipated launch in the second half of this year. Now, the move by Bhatia makes perfect sense.
She is an excellent choice to run the new digital bank given her experience at Marcus, not to mention her time at Stripe and PayPal.
For those of you not following the European banking market, Openbank is the largest digital banking brand in Europe in terms of assets, with €18 billion in deposits across Spain, Portugal, Germany and the Netherlands.
The bank will face stiff competition in the U.S. from both fintechs and traditional banks, including others that have made the jump from the UK and Europe.
If you are a golf fan, defending Masters Champion Jon Rahm is Santander’s global ambassador and will be wearing the Openbank logo on his shirt this week in Augusta.
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