FinTech News

HMBradley Launches Digital Banking Product that Rewards High Savings Rates

When the Federal Reserve made two emergency cuts to interest rates amid the COVID-19 pandemic, many formerly high-yield savings products lost a bit of their luster. Meanwhile a growing trend in FinTech online banking offerings (which typically come via partnerships with actual banks with FDIC deposit insurance) has been to peg interest rates to different achievements. That’s certainly the case with HMBradley, who just officially launched their digital banking product this week.

With HMBradley, account holders will be able to unlock increasingly higher interest rates by upping the percentage of their deposits that they save. This is determined by the percentage of quarterly deposits that users end up saving. Thanks to Savings Tiers, those with savings rates of 5% or more will earn 0.5% APY on their funds, while those who save at least 10% or more will earn 1% APY. What’s more a 15% or higher savings rate will unlock 2% APY and finally saving more than 20% will allow account holders to earn an impressive 3% APY. These interest rates are available on balances of up to $100,000.

Beyond their unique APY structure, HMBradley will also offer a number of popular features meant to make banking easy. For example the account’s debit card will give users access to a network of more than 55,000 free ATMs. Additionally HMBradley offers a feature called Plans where customers can easily set up savings targets and arrange for automated transfers that can help them better achieve these goals. Notably funds diverted to one or multiple Plans will still be eligible for earning interest through Savings Tiers.

In a press release announcing the official launch of the digital banking service, HMBradley’s co-founder and CEO Zach Bruhnke stated, “We are so excited to open our virtual doors and welcome people from all income brackets as we introduce a new way to bank.” Bruhnke added, “We want to empower and protect every consumer financially to show them that a bank can be on their side, regardless of how much money they make.”

With a potential APY of 3%, it looks as though HMBradley is coming through where Robinhood’s original “Checking and Savings” account fell short. That said, there are definitely downsides to HMBradley’s model as those with savings rates below 5% won’t earn any interest — nor will those unable or unwilling to set up direct deposit for their account. Still their Savings Tiers concept is truly intriguing and once again demonstrates the creativity coming from the FinTech sector.