Square launches small business banking

By Anna Irrera

July 20 (Reuters) - Square Inc , the company led by Twitter Inc CEO Jack Dorsey, is launching banking services for small businesses, as it continues to grow beyond payments processing.

Square Banking will offer small businesses savings and checking accounts, as well as its existing lending offering which has been renamed Square Loans, the San Francisco-based company said on Tuesday.

Square Checking will have no account minimums, overdraft fees, or recurring fees and saving accounts will offer a 0.5% annual percent yield on deposits.

Square hopes its new checking and savings accounts, which build upon its debit card offering, will be attractive to small businesses who have struggled to gain access to more mainstream banking services, said Christina Riechers, Square Banking's head of product.

"There is no monthly fee so we see this as having high potential to get folks into more formalized business banking," Riechers said in an interview.

Deposits collected from small businesses will be lent back through Square Loans, she said.

The new services come following the launch of the company's industrial bank, Square Financial Services, which began operations in March after completing the charter approval process with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) and the Utah Department of Financial Institutions.

The industrial bank is part of efforts by Square to expand its revenue stream beyond facilitating card payments for small businesses.

The company's consumer business Cash App has been booming, with first quarter revenue excluding bitcoin investing up 139% year on year to $529 million.

While initially, only small business deposits will be brought under the Square Financial Services umbrella, over time the company will look to have the bank work across its range of products and services, a spokesman said.

The renamed lending business will continue to offer loans to sellers based on data from their transactions.

The business, previously called Square Capital, saw revenues drop during the pandemic, with the company pausing its main loan offering for small businesses to focus instead on offering government-funded Paycheck Protection Program loans.

Since restarting lending the company says it has seen volumes recovering.

(Reporting by Anna Irrera; editing by Jason Neely)

((Anna.Irrera@thomsonreuters.com; +1 646 223 4005 ;))