Column

Column is a nationally chartered bank built as a developer platform, offering programmable FDIC-insured accounts, customisable card network access, automatic cheque acceptance, real-time payments, international wires over Swift and a lending stack covering origination, debt financing and loan purchase.

Being the bank and the platform simultaneously is the entire proposition and it removes the layer everything else in this category depends on. Most banking-as-a-service is a technology company reselling access to a sponsor bank, so every product decision passes through a partner and every regulatory question involves two parties. A chartered bank with its own developer platform answers directly for both.

Direct Swift access is the concrete expression of that. Most platforms route international wires through a correspondent chain, adding cost and opacity, whereas a bank with its own Swift connectivity controls the routing and can explain where a payment is.

The lending capability is unusually complete for this category, covering origination partnerships, debt financing to scale a lending book and loan purchase. A fintech growing a lending business hits a capital constraint quickly, since loans consume balance sheet, and a partner that both originates and finances addresses the constraint rather than only the mechanics. Realtime covers the newest Federal Reserve and Clearing House rails. Rates are not published.