Atomic

What does it take to earn someone's trust as their primary financial relationship? According to Laurel Taylor, Founder and CEO of Candidly, consumers aren't asking banks to know everything about them. They're asking banks to actually use what they already know — and turn it into something actionable. Most people don't even know HSAs have triple tax advantage benefits. That's a free win sitting in the data banks already have. Read the full interview with Laurel → https://lnkd.in/euzKn5CC

The future of banking isn't about eliminating financial problems. It's about helping people solve better ones. In the latest edition of Yours in Finance, Mary Wisniewski sits down with Laurel Taylor, Founder & CEO of Candidly, to discuss financial wellness, AI-powered guidance, and what banks need to do to remain relevant in an era of increasingly personalized digital experiences. One line that stuck with us: "We're always going to have problems to solve. We want those problems to be higher quality over time." From the promise of holistic financial guidance to why AI agents should never complete transactions without consumer approval, Laurel shares a thoughtful perspective on how technology can help people move from financial survival to financial optimization. Read the full interview → https://lnkd.in/euzKn5CC Follow along as Yours in Finance continues exploring how the people shaping banking and fintech are thinking about the future.

Episode 1 of The Action Layer is live. In our first episode, Jordan Wright sat down with Maya Mikhailov, founder and CEO of Savvi AI, to talk about what it actually means for financial institutions to own their AI — and what's at stake if they don't. They cover a lot of ground: why banks that keep renting AI from vendors risk paying to get their own customer intelligence back, the real story behind the OpenAI-Plaid partnership, why a decade of dashboards left banks with a picture of the past but no tools to act on what's next, and what agentic AI actually looks like inside a regulated institution. This clip gets at the heart of it — the difference between knowing something about your customer and actually doing something about it. Watch the full episode here: https://lnkd.in/ewvp_XfZ

Transaction data has a new job: helping you decide where to eat. A startup called Zest is using transaction data to power restaurant recommendations, turning purchase history into a map of your dining habits and personal taste. It's a fascinating example of a broader shift: financial data is increasingly showing up in experiences banks never built—from restaurant guides to dating apps to AI assistants. In her latest Atomic Insights column, Mary Wisniewski explores what happens when transaction data becomes a tool for understanding identity, preferences, and behavior—not just finances. Read the full article here: https://lnkd.in/eEq4vXrX

The Action Layer is here. Banks think the OpenAI × Plaid tie-up is about personal finance. Maya Mikhailov sees something else entirely — a play to make banks rent back their own customers. Full episode drops Wednesday. 👀 The Action Layer | Ep. 1 feat. Maya Mikhailov, Founder & CEO of Savvi AI

Introducing The Action Layer. A new interview series from Atomic exploring the space between fintech ideas and real-world outcomes. During SF Fintech Week, Atomic CEO and Co-Founder Jordan Wright sat down with founders, investors, operators, and industry leaders to discuss what it actually takes to move from insight to action in financial services. Across conversations with leaders like Cynthia Chen (Kikoff), Maya Mikhailov (Savvi AI), Snigdha Kumar (Brico), and Rex Salisbury (Cambrian), one theme kept surfacing: The future of fintech isn't about giving people more information — it's about helping them take action. → Helping consumers rebuild credit and settle debt they couldn't afford to carry → Enabling financial institutions to build and own their customer intelligence before someone else does → Removing the compliance friction that quietly blocks go-to-market and product strategy → And figuring out where AI is genuinely changing behavior vs. where it's still just hype At Atomic, we spend a lot of time thinking about the gap between financial intent and action. These conversations explore that same question from some of the sharpest people building the future of financial services. We'll be sharing clips, insights, and full interviews over the coming weeks. Stay tuned.

Introducing Yours in Finance — a new series where Mary Wisniewski asks the same questions of the people shaping the future of banking and fintech, and lets the range of answers tell the story of where the industry is headed. First up: Greg Palmer, VP of Strategy and host of Finovate, who's spent 15 years with a front-row seat to fintech's explosion and has some sharp takes on trust, automation, and what actually earns a financial institution the right to be your primary bank. Our favorite line from him? "The phone doesn't care." Greg is the first of many — follow along as we build out this series one conversation at a time. Read the full interview → https://lnkd.in/ev6Nnz_y

Really interesting conversation between Alex Johnson and Ryan K. on the finale of Banking on Primacy. The question that stuck with us: when AI starts making financial decisions on behalf of consumers, whose side is it on? Most of the industry is building AI that makes it easier to spend. But for everyday Americans, the harder and more valuable problems look different — switching to a better rate, catching a bill that crept up, moving a direct deposit, canceling the subscription you forgot about. Those aren't conversations or nudges that encourage spend. They're actions that have the consumers best interest in mind. And that's the real shift ahead: AI in financial services won't be judged by how well it chats, but by whether it can safely *do things* for people — and whether the incentives behind it put the consumer first. Ryan's point about accountability is the right anchor. You can't sue the loom. Someone has to be responsible for the actions AI takes, and trust will accrue to the institutions that get that right. Worth a listen: https://lnkd.in/gQ5W8WqX

For years, the whole goal was to make payments disappear. Cash App just shipped a literal magic wand. The payments industry spent years chasing frictionless. Gen Z is asking why their payment method can't also be a personality trait. Mary Wisniewski on the Atomic Insights blog today — tracing the line from metal status cards to DIY TikTok wands to what Block is really betting on with the Cash App Wand. Link in the comments 🪄

We'll be at American Banker Digital Banking next week — if you've been looking for a way to turn your digital banking experience into an action layer that actually moves money, switches direct deposits, manages bills, and deepens customer relationships, let's talk. Come find the Atomic team onsite, or schedule time with us ahead of the conference: https://lnkd.in/gBmZm3JC See you in Orlando!