By Riley Kaminer
Do you already have enough metal cards banging around in your wallet, pocket, or purse yet? If you live in Miami and work in tech, chances are you do.
But new Miami challenger bank Onyx Private is making the case for you to add their premium 17g metal card to your collection.
Onyx Private provides a comprehensive banking solution for people who are looking for a premium product but are not wealthy enough to access a traditional private banker.
Today, the company announced that they have raised $4.1 million to bring their product into the pockets of more affluent professionals. Participants include Village Global, Global Founders Capital, One Way Ventures, 186 Ventures, and Olive Tree Capital. Y Combinator, whose accelerator program Onyx Private participated in over winter 2022, also took part in this funding round.
Onyx Private plans to deploy this capital to market its product to more of its target audience, having grown to this point primarily through referrals. It also plans to develop new products, including an in-app human financial advisor, this year.
Co-founder and CEO Victor Santos [pictured above] told TechCrunch that the idea came to him and his co-founders, Douglas Lopes and Tiago Passinato, when they were working on developing a fintech for low-income consumers. They decided to fill the gap in the market between all the options for the very wealthy and the low income.
“These are people who are not necessarily rich, but are affluent professionals, like lawyers, doctors or people who work in tech,” explained Santos. “The goal for Onyx is to build a more modern, more accessible private bank and democratize the tools that today are only available to the ‘ultra rich.’”
And so far, this mission has been a success. Since launching in 2022, Onyx claims a 30% monthly growth rate – processing upwards of $4 million in transactions each month.
“There’s a lot of pressure on these new banks focused on low income, and what we think is powerful is that our average revenue per user and the average balance of our user is 10 to 12 times more than these traditional neobanks,” Santos said. “We are small but it goes to show that it’s a much different demographic and there’s a higher willingness to pay for premium services from that demographic.”
Onyx includes a wide range of services, including high-yield savings accounts, a cash back debit card, and a lifestyle concierge that helps with things like booking events and finding flights.
Once users successfully apply to join Onyx Private, they can pay for an account starting at $40 a month.
“Onyx is transforming private banking to better serve today’s high earners,” Semyon Dukach, founder and managing partner of One Way Ventures, shared in a statement. “We’re delighted to support their groundbreaking approach and believe that this funding will empower them to redefine private banking for the upcoming generation of affluent professionals. The Onyx founders’ extensive experience puts them in an ideal position to build a trailblazing private bank.”
Miami is increasingly a hub for forward-thinking fintech companies – from Novo to NovoPayment to PaySend, MAJORITY, and more.
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