Goldman soft launches retail bank in UK

A report in the Financial Times suggests that Goldman Sachs’s lending and deposit platform Marcus has today launched in the UK.

According to the article, the bank has sent an internal memo advising that Marcus would be open to UK-based staff from today, ahead of a wider rollout over the next few weeks.

Marcus, which is named after the investment bank’s founder, launched in the US in 2016 and has rapidly built up a substantial loanbook. By April of this year, the platform had already lent over $3bn to US consumers.

Net revenues for Goldman’s Investing & Lending division – which includes Marcus – rose 43 per cent to $2.1bn in the first quarter of this year. Meanwhile the bank has said previously that it expects to hold $28bn of online loans on its balance sheet by 2020, with online lending earmarked as its biggest single revenue growth opportunity over the next three years.

The Financial Times reports that the platform's wider UK launch, planned for September, is later than originally planned.

Some have suggested that Marcus will emerge as a rival to the likes of Monzo,Starling and Revolut. However, it seems more likely that the platform will focus on savings and loans, rather than on a cutting-edge current account – in which case the likes of Atom Bank and, in time, Zopa (which is currently seeking a banking licence) are more likely competitors.