NEW YORK—JPMorgan Chase is taking steps to open a digital bank in the U.K. by the end of the year.
The banking firm has been talking with London regulators about the idea, Pymnts.com reported.
The operation will likely include savings and lending products, and it comes just two years after U.S. bank Goldman Sachs launched a digital bank called Marcus in the U.K.
“Goldman’s strategy is to lure U.K. customers with high-interest rates for savings accounts, and then lowering its group funding costs that way. Marcus racked up $16.9 billion in the U.K. using that method,” Pymnts.com said.
JPMorgan Chase tapped an ex-regulator, Clive Adamson, to head up the efforts to launch the digital bank. Adamson was a former head of supervision at the Financial Conduct Authority. Since leaving that role in 2015, he has worked in other capacities for JPMorgan, chairing its international business between 2016 and 2019. Currently, he works as a non-executive director at the JPMorgan Securities PLC, one of the bank’s primary European legal arms.