Where some see crisis, others find an opportunity.
The US financial system suffered turbulence last month when Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) fell and the government took control of the institution. The tremor affected other entities such as Signature or First Republic, medium-sized or regional establishments that ran out of funds to meet their obligations to customers.
The SVB marked the point of that quake, a bank that had worked mostly with technology companies.
Precisely Apple, the top in this sector, the most valued company with some 315,000 million dollars, decided that this was the moment to take a step forward, despite the doubts surrounding the banking health.
His new contribution is not an evolution of the Mac, nor a next-generation iPhone or a watch that is almost capable of reading thoughts.
At this point in its business evolution, an adventure that began in 1984, the Cupertino company took one of its most relevant turns by announcing this week that, in collaboration with Goldman Sachs, it is entering the competition for bank deposits.
The company with the bitten apple launched a high-yield account for savers. Its remuneration stands at 4.15% per year, an interest ten times higher than that offered by the competition. The US average is 0.37%, according to data from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC).
This account is available together with the credit card that Apple took out in 2019 and that had 6.7 million holders in 2022.
This is the latest step in the direction of the financial services space including a “buy now, pay later” option for holders on its hardware products.
Also, as a loyalty element, the account can be managed from the iPhone's Wallet app, which can help keep consumers connected to the software ecosystem behind their devices.
This savings account requires no minimum deposit and is FDIC protected. There is a maximum balance of $250,000.
The favorable rate of return, combined with the prestige and recognition of the brand, are considered attractive factors to attract new clients at a time of doubts about the stability of the banking industry, Wall Street analysts said.
In this sense, Apple Pay, its mobile payment system, is a dominant competitor in digital subscriptions, but in the field of this new service you will find much more contention.
It has the disadvantage that the money cannot be spent directly from the savings account, but must first be transferred to a checking account in the Apple Cash application. And although 4.15% is higher interest than the standard, there are at least five other online savings accounts that even offer up to 5% per year.
“Experts agree that this latest offer from Apple is quite tempting,” Chanelle Bessette, a banking specialist at NerdWallet, told MarketWatch.
As Steve Cocheo illustrates in The Financial Brand , "Thinking that Apple Savings is simply an offer for Goldman Sachs to collect deposits is like thinking that iPhones are great devices for making phone calls through a wireless carrier."
Apple doesn't play the same game as traditional financial institutions, which focus more on taking and holding deposits. Those of Cupertino would have more an intention to capture and move.
They play to the advantage that popular APRs like Ally Bank's or Goldman Sachs' Marcus Deposit offer lower rates of 3.75% and 3.9%, respectively.
Given the collaboration with Goldman Sachs for its operation, the launch of Apple leads one to think about the possible cannibalization of the Marcus savings for the new one offered by the technology company.
David Solomon, executive director of the investment bank, downplayed that phenomenon.
"Obviously we've worked very closely on the overlap between who has the credit card and who has a Marcus deposit," Solomon told CNBC.
"We are going to observe very closely whether or not this cannibalization occurs," he acknowledged. “For us, this opens up another deposit channel and it's always good to broaden that base,” he added.
But there is something clear. Goldman Sachs has a reputation as a greedy bank while "what is special in this case is that Apple is Apple," according to experts.
