Chime agreed to pay $590 million in cash for Stride Bank, the nationally chartered lender that has held its members' accounts for seven years, and raised its guidance for the third quarter and the full year alongside the announcement.
The usual fintech route to a bank charter is to keep renting one, or to apply for a new charter and wait years for it. Chris Britt bought the bank his company was already using, and said the reason is speed rather than economics.
"And for us, you know, I've been clear, I think, on this topic, which is that we always looked at the bank charter as more of a when, not an if given these grand ambitions that we have."
Britt co-founded Chime and has taken it from a first year as a public company whose stock reaction he says disappointed him to five consecutive quarters of beating and raising, with more than 10 million monthly active members.
I listened to the full interview so you can skip it.
Here are the 6 takeaways that matter.
👤 Guest: Chris Britt, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Chime
🎙️ Host: David Faber, Co-Anchor of Squawk on the Street on CNBC, interviewing from the Goldman Sachs technology conference in San Francisco
📰 Published: 9 September 2026 on CNBC
🔴 CNBC | ⏱️ 7 min
Key Takeaways
Chime bought the bank it was already renting rather than applying for a charter of its own
$590 million in cash for a partner of seven years, founded in 1913 in Enid, Oklahoma
The stated reason for owning the bank is speed, not cost savings
Third-party approvals and compliance reviews were stopping finished products at the last step
Chime has beaten and raised guidance five quarters running as a public company
The new third-quarter guidance is 30% revenue growth and a 17% EBITDA margin
The 10% workforce cut in July was about removing management layers, not about AI replacing people
AI was part of it, Britt said, but not the main reason
The cost of serving a member has fallen about 10% a year for four years while the member base grew past 10 million
He expects consumers to prefer a regulated financial partner as AI reshapes the product, which is the advantage he thinks owning a bank buys
1. Buying Its Own Bank
Faber opened on the deal — a $590 million all-cash purchase of Chime's longtime banking partner — and on the bank itself: "Speaking of hometowns, this bank was founded in 1913 in Enid, Oklahoma. I've been there. Have you?" Britt said he had been a few times.
Faber's framing of the news: "After the fintech company raised its outlook and announced a $590 million cash deal to buy its longtime banking partner Stride Bank." Shares were higher on the day
Asked why not simply keep the partnership, Britt started with the ambition rather than the deal: "We want to be the leader in primary bank accounts in America. And we've shown explosive growth over the past decade."
The scale he is defending: "We now have over 10 million monthly actives, relying on Chime as the primary way to manage their money and make financial progress."
On why the charter was never a question of whether: "And for us, you know, I've been clear, I think, on this topic, which is that we always looked at the bank charter as more of a when, not an if given these grand ambitions that we have."
His account of the timing is three conditions arriving together: "And so every year we looked at the opportunity to potentially extend partnerships, add new bank partners. And this time it felt like the time was right, given the changes in technology, the regulatory window that's opened, and most importantly, just the confidence that we have in this incredible team at Stride"
He credited Stride's chief executive, who he said has been part of the bank for more than 50 years, and said he is confident about integrating the bank and keeping business as usual for members
2. Velocity Over Approvals
Faber pushed on the substance: what can Chime do as an owner that it could not do as a customer? Britt gave two answers, and put the weight on the second.
The first is accountability. "We are at the size and the scale that we feel, you know, we should no longer be reliant on third parties," he said, adding: "We are the ultimate accountable party for excellence in service and product delivery and so forth."
The second is the one he called decisive: "I think the number one thing that we're trying to achieve here, beyond just the economic advantages that we can talk about, is greater velocity."
The mechanism is the approval queue on a regulated product. "Whenever you work with a third party bank, this is a highly regulated category," he said, describing a production line where "if you get to the one yard line and then you get sort of slowed down by third party approvals, compliance and so forth, it just slows you down"
He tied the cost of that delay to how fast software can now be built, saying products, software and experiences can be made faster than ever in what he called this age of AI
What he expects from unification: "So we think having all of this data and processes unified within Chime is going to unlock a massive increase in the ability to innovate for our members."
3. Beat And Raise, Five Times
Faber turned to the stock, which he said has been a good story lately but was not always one, and asked whether the business has the momentum to keep the growth numbers coming.
"We've had five quarters now of beat and raise as a public company. So I feel really good about that," Britt said
On the first year: "The first year I'd be lying if I didn't say I was a little disappointed with the stock reaction." Faber asked what he learned from his investors in that period
His answer was about the company's history rather than about investor relations: "Chime is a company that was not an instant success. We had some tough road along the way. And so I think that really built a lot of character in the business."
He said the people at Chime are mission driven and that focusing on members and products is what produces the results
The new numbers he put on the quarter: "So now Q3, we said 30% top line growth and 17% EBITDA margin, which is close to a rule of 50 almost."
The rule of 40 — or 50, on the harder version Britt is invoking — adds a software company's growth rate to its profit margin and treats the total as a single measure of quality
4. AI, Layers And Jade
Faber said Britt had reported AI-assisted code rising from 29% to 84% of code shipped over four months, and noted that Chime cut its workforce by about 10% at the end of July. He asked whether the two were related.
Britt separated them: "No. You know, the change in workforce was really about reducing layers. And sure, AI was a part of it, but it was not the main reason for the change. It was more about smaller teams operating with greater speed, given the ability to use new AI tools."
On the internal effect, he said AI is creating an opportunity to be more productive and efficient "without having to increase the size of the workforce dramatically", and that it has changed operations dramatically
The member-facing version is a new assistant: "And then even with our new AI assistant, Jade, it gives deep insights into your spending history. It gives you tips on what to do."
The example he gave is subscription cleanup: "Even better, it can help you, you know, cancel subscriptions if it sees that you've got multiple recurrences that don't make sense."
He said the member experience is at an early stage of what AI can do to it, rather than finished
5. Cutting The Cost To Serve
Faber asked which productivity measures investors should track to see the progress, and what hiring looks like over the next year.
The metric Britt offered: "Well, if you look over the past four years, we've reduced our cost to serve by 10% per year while we've increased our member base up now over 10 million active."
Cost to serve is what it costs Chime to support one member for a period — the support, processing and fraud expense per account rather than the cost of acquiring the account
He said the efficiency side is already visible and that the next phase is the consumer experience in what he called an AI driven world
His competitive claim rests on regulation rather than technology: "And I think at the end of the day, consumers in the financial services space are going to want to work with a partner that is trusted and works within the regulated realm that's required in the banking and financial services space."
6. Getting It Past The Fed
Faber's last question was on timing.
Asked when the deal closes, Britt said: "First half of next year. Knock on wood. Of course we have to go through the Fed and OCC approval," and pointed to the relationships Chime already has with its regulators
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency charters and supervises national banks, which is what Stride is; the Federal Reserve approves the change in ownership
Bonus Insights
Faber said the interview was Britt's first on CNBC, and that Chime's stock was up over 6% on the day of the deal and the raised guidance
Faber has been to Enid, Oklahoma, and asked Britt whether he had; Britt said he had been a few times over the seven years of the partnership
Britt said the plan after closing is business as usual for members, while the reason for doing the deal is a step change in how quickly Chime can ship new products
Britt's bottom line is that Chime's constraint was never the economics of renting a bank charter but the time it costs to get a finished product through someone else's compliance queue, and that owning Stride is what he expects to remove it.
Products, Companies & Tools Mentioned
Chime (Britt's company, with over 10 million monthly active members and a stated goal of leading primary bank accounts in America)
Stride Bank (The nationally chartered bank founded in 1913 in Enid, Oklahoma that has been Chime's banking partner for seven years, being bought for $590 million in cash)
Jade (Chime's new AI assistant, which Britt said gives spending insights, tips and can cancel duplicate subscriptions)
Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Reserve (The two regulators whose approval the deal needs before it can close)
Books & Resources Mentioned
Chime's announcement of the Stride Bank acquisition (The release Britt referred to, which carried the raised third-quarter and full-year guidance he quoted)
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