Hello! Kiah here. Welcome to Fintech Takes Banking, my weekly newsletter where I highlight things I think are interesting or important for bankers and the surrounding environs.  

Today’s newsletter is drawn from material shared on stage or with me at CBA Live 2026, which happened last week in San Diego. Thank you to the CBA team for allowing me to attend!

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It is both true and uninteresting to say the world has always been chaotic, that we have always “lived in interesting times” (derogatory). 

Six years ago, it was Covid-19. Three years ago, the financial services space witnessed a rapid bank run and the second-largest bank failure in U.S. history, which started the chain reaction leading to the failure of two other institutions.  Today, it’s… U.S. military action in the Middle East? Artificial intelligence? Democracy and the courts? Dealer’s choice.

The worries tied to these “interesting times” aren’t always about money and finances — sometimes these feelings relate to big, existential questions. But you’d be surprised how many of the chaotic, uncertain events tie back to a bottom line. How many stories have you seen about gas or airline prices, or the outlook for labor and the value of a college degree? 

I don’t know about you, but for most purposes, the emotions I feel about these news items are sometimes not helpful emotions for me. These kinds of emotions don’t enhance my decision-making ability, don’t empower my sense of agency, don’t help me be my best self. They don’t support the belief in a better future that I may be around to experience. I call these “money-adjacent problems” — it’s not “I don’t know where to invest my money” but “money stresses me out.”

In fact, financial anxiety may be one of the defining traits of Generation Z, according to a recent article in The Atlantic, even if there is some evidence that the cohort is more financially savvy than earlier generations when they were the same age. 

“[H]ypervigilance and nihilism are just two different responses to the same uncertainty: If you don’t know what the future holds, you might scrupulously manage every cent to your name. Or you might laugh darkly, mutter ‘What future?,’ and log onto Polymarket to try to make a quick buck,” wrote Faith Hill in The Atlantic. 

This can be a giant problem for financial institutions, but it also carries costs for the consumer. Someone who feels out of control, overwhelmed and hopeless is vulnerable to manipulation. Conversely, they may feel stuck and unable to make decisions that will bring them closer to their long-term financial goals because they think it’s too risky. They’re looking for help, comfort and stability — the question is whether they find it and who they find it from.

The concept that the emotions that we feel in the present greatly outweigh the emotions we will feel in the future is called “present bias.” Present bias can make it hard for someone to make a decision that has some implications in the future, which is most decisions. It can be hard for people to think about or connect to their future, especially given the power of present bias, said Jeff Kreisler, head of behavioral science at JPMorgan's Private Bank, during a keynote at CBA Live 2026 in San Diego on March 31. 

Behavioral science is the study of how emotion and psychology impact decision-making and behavior. Kreisler’s session focused on the behavior science concepts that could explain customers' behavior, especially if those actions are irrational, self-defeating or against their long-term interests, as well as what bankers and institutions can do about it. 

“Making good financial decisions is hard,” he said. “A financial decision is an emotional, personal decision. It's about doing something now for the benefit of the future — a future that's uncertain, that's scary, that's uncontrollable.”

And while financial institutions can’t change their customers or the emotions, fears and concerns their customers experience, they can use behavioral science to understand their customers’ motivations alongside their aspirations. Some common behavioral science concepts that a customer thinking about money might encounter include: 

• Mental accounting: A person thinks, feels and behaves differently towards their money depending on the source or the use of it. 
• Loss aversion: People experience the pain of a loss as more intense than the pleasure of a gain, causing them to focus on the downside. 
• Social proof: Individuals behave the way they believe others like them behave. 
• The need for control: The desire to have influence and agency, especially in response to the perception of external factors or forces.

It’s becoming more important that bankers understand how money and finances make their customers think and feel, given artificial intelligence’s ability to synthesize information and data, Kreisler argued. Sometimes, more data and numbers can make customers feel more uncertain and unsure; bankers can offer understanding and compassion if they can build and maintain customer trust. 

Trust can be a bit of a cliché in banking; you hear it so often, it becomes meaningless. Kreisler said trust is built and reinforced on three attributes: honesty, ability and benevolence. Do you tell the truth? Do you know what you’re talking about? And are you acting in my interest, or yours?

Questions about trust are interesting and complicated in a financial services landscape that increasingly telegraphs mixed messages to consumers who feel stuck and overwhelmed. The opportunity for bankers is to communicate and act in ways that build trustworthiness in the midst of all this noise.

What trust looks like will depend on the institution and the consumer. SoFi Technologies’ marketing message focuses on helping consumers get their money “right.” What that meant to Anthony Noto, CEO of San Francisco-based company, was a rollout of banking services that expanded far beyond borrowing.

“If we say, ‘We help you get your money right’ but don't do saving, spending, investing, protecting, then there's no reason to believe us if we just did borrowing,” he said on stage at CBA Live. The company’s product road map had these services launch at the end of 2019.

The company wanted to be where its customers are, and its higher-income earners love sports. So the company slapped its logo on the side of a stadium in Los Angeles in a 20-year naming deal totaling $625 million. Noto said the company’s name recognition shoots up during the NFL season, aided by stadium shots and ad campaigns. 

More recently, Noto said banking customers “actually want” to be involved with and invested in crypto, but they also want the services from a bank that they trust and know. While this particular SoFi customer deeply does not desire any involvement with crypto, I can buy the argument that some of the 14% of Americans who report owning crypto might be more inclined to purchase or custody it at their bank rather than an exchange.

It would be a mistake to limit this conversation to retail banking, even though I was at a Consumer Bankers Association event, and seriously, the consumer financial space is all sorts of messed up right now. But small businesses are run by consumers; arguably, their financial needs and concerns are more complex, and the stakes can often be higher. 

To reduce their mental load and reduce operational complexity, small businesses are looking for financial partners they can rely on as a “one-stop shop,” Shruti Patel, EVP and chief product officer at U.S. Bank’s business banking segment, told me in an interview. The customer rationale is straightforward: the business already trusts its financial institution with its funds. According to U.S. Bank’s 2025 Small Business Survey, 87% of small business owners viewed digital tools as very important or essential, up 15 percentage points from the year prior. More than eight in 10 preferred their bank to provide digital solutions for banking, payments or other administrative tasks.

But small business, which the Small Business Administration defines as entities with fewer than 500 employees, is a vast and diverse space. On top of that, she said many of these enterprises are operating on thin margins and are trying to control operational costs, so they’re looking to their banks for assistance in running the back office efficiently. 

“You want to be able to solve as many needs as possible for the small business,” she said. The winner of the bank that solves the most problems wins a small business’s deposit and relationship primacy. 

Meeting these needs is what’s driving U.S. Bank’s investments in embedding capabilities within its business banking accounts, including services like accounts receivable and payable, spend management and payroll, into affordably and appropriately priced products. (I’ve written previously about this here.) That’s right: bundling is alive and well in the commercial space. At U.S. Bank, Shruti said they have a “business essentials” account with deposits and payment acceptance, and other products that have card and spend management capabilities. 

The adoption of bundled business accounts has interesting implications and use cases for the bundled consumer checking accounts that my colleague Alex discussed in his Fintech Meetup write-up. And for what it’s worth, SoFi recently launched SoFi Big Business Banking, an offering that gives enterprise partners the ability to manage both fiat and crypto banking within the bank.

Financial institutions’ core business (and risk) is maturity transformation: borrowing today and tomorrow’s funds to finance an asset that lives in the future. If you’ll allow me some creative license, financial maturity transformation works because banks convince customers to engage in emotional maturity transformation. So many financial decisions are about the future: The dreams I have today will be my reality in the future, and a loan can help me transform that today into my tomorrow. The loans to go to college to get a good job. The savings account becomes a mortgage that becomes a home. The business loan that turns a sole proprietor into a shop with five employees. 

The dream takes a long time to achieve, the bank balance takes a long time to grow, the asset takes a long time to pay off. It’s already plenty hard to think about the future. It’s unknown, uncertain and can feel increasingly bleak. For many people, it feels bad to think about the future. Nihilism can be a reasonable or logical choice if someone can’t find a way to counteract present bias, to be guided to thinking about the future. But chastising and criticizing consumers for feeling nihilistic feels unlikely to change behavior long-term.

Making financial choices is like being on a rocking sailboat in the ocean with rough water, Kreisler said. Staring at the hull will make you feel sick. Staring at the horizon will make you feel calm. Bankers have an opportunity and responsibility to help their customers lift their eyes to the horizon and to stay on the boat until it can get to its destination on the horizon.

FROM THE VAULT

What I’ve been reading, watching and listening to this week:

🎭 Big weekend for The Arts: I saw “The Drama,” “Project Hail Mary” and “Riverdance 30” this last weekend. I’m glad Project Hail Mary was as good as everyone said it was, and I liked The Drama more than some of the reviews I saw. But OH MY GOD GUYS Riverdance was so fun. Highly recommend you see it if the U.S. tour comes to your town! (Also, the Riverdance album was the first album I bought in full from the iTunes Store.)

👋🏻 I don’t think about my hands that much: even though I use them to do almost everything (and I love getting my nails done — a different topic for another day!). Bryne Hobart wrote an interesting essay about why it’s really hard to build a robotic hand that is as versatile as a human hand. Reading it will give you a new appreciation of all the ways our hands are strong, dexterous and sensitive! 

🎙️ On Bank Nerd Corner: Catherine Leffert joins me for my latest show, “Closing Credits,” to rewatch and rehash movies with financial or money themes. We started with the 2011 classic “Margin Call,” dissecting the vibes, org chart and whether it was the right amount of financial, or not financial enough.  The next poll is live and ends on Wednesday! 

🛫 Catch me at: New York Fintech Week with my friend and coworker Alex Johnson. First up is Innov8 Village Happy Hour on April 29, in partnership with Team8. I’ll also be talking smack courtside during the Fintech Takes 3v3 Classic on April 30.

Thanks for reading! Let me know your thoughts on this piece. Also, I have a race coming up so I am officially accepting submissions for what should go on my race playlist!

– Kiah

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