Banking needs a force for good.
Banking for all
Every person, regardless of net worth, should be treated fairly by a bank that wants them to succeed.
We mean every person. Varo has no tolerance for discrimination—not based on race, sex, sexual orientation, gender, age, disability, or any other basis of discrimination. Everyone is welcome at Varo today, and everyone will be welcome tomorrow.
We believe...
…banks should be a force for good.
And they should help people live better lives.
We believe everyone deserves to be treated with respect.
And that net worth does not equal self-worth.
We believe your bank should be in your corner.
And should never make money by taking advantage of you.
We believe your bank should help you make progress.
And be totally transparent.
We actually help.
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How we make money
We don’t charge many fees. So how do we keep the lights on?
Every time you use your Varo Visa® Debit Card, the merchant pays us a small percentage of the transaction. We also make money from our partners when you take advantage of their offers. To get to where we are now, we’ve raised funds from investors who believe in our mission to help everyone improve their financial life.
A word from our founder.
“We’re building a bank from the ground up to improve the financial health of our customers through better technology and total transparency.
From the start, our team has paired banking veterans with tech experts to build a mobile-only bank account that makes smart financial choices easy.”
— Colin Walsh, CEO and Co-Founder
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Varo leadership
Deep Varma
Technology
Marina Gracias
Legal
Carolyn Feinstein
Marketing, Growth, Design
Jakub Jurek
Data
Pepe Porrata
Operations, Control, Business Enablement
Jon Alferness
Product
May O’Neal
People
Thibault Fulconis
Finance
Philippa Girling
Risk
Lisa Violet
Audit
Shishir Singhania
Lending
America's first digital consumer bank
Varo was founded to make a powerful impact on systemic financial inequality that Americans have experienced for generations—and Varo’s founders knew that to tackle this head on, we needed to be a chartered national bank. This was a truly trailblazing strategy—no charter had ever been issued to a consumer fintech.
After a three year quest, Varo was the first US consumer fintech to receive a national bank charter from the OCC. The national bank charter allows Varo to deploy its proprietary, cutting-edge technology and directly innovate across a range of financial products to improve the financial health of the millions of Americans who have been overlooked and underserved by the traditional financial system.
Timeline
2020 |
August Official opening of Varo Bank, N.A. June OCC approval for national bank charter May Series D Close February FDIC approval for deposit insurance January Varo 2 Varo Launch |
2019 |
August No Fee Overdraft Launch April Series C Close |
2018 |
December Android Launch August Received preliminary approval from OCC for national bank charter March Salt Lake City office opening January Series B Close |
2017 |
July Filed for national bank charter with the OCC Varo Savings Account Launched June iOS public launch |
2016 |
December First customers join Varo in our Beta on iOS April Series A Close |
2015 |
October Varo is founded in San Francisco |