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Masthaven secures retail banking licence

Rebekah Commane
Written By:
Posted:
April 21, 2016
Updated:
April 21, 2016

Masthaven Bank has been granted a retail banking licence by the Prudential Regulation Authority and the Financial Conduct Authority.

Part of Masthaven Finance, the digital bank plans to introduce a customer-led flexible savings and mortgage proposition and employee partnership structure.

The challenger bank said the new offering will allow the management team to ‘deliver on its vision to build a bank that puts people in control of their own financial goals.’

It will be led by managing director Jon Hall (pictured), who joined the business in December 2014 from Saffron Building Society, where he was chief executive.

Of the new venture, Hall said: “In a world of ever increasing personalisation, many people want to take more control of their money and make it work harder for them. We’re determined to buck the ‘one size fits all’ approach to banking by helping retail customers play a bigger role in tailoring products to best suit their needs.”

The new offering will enable customers to build their own products from launch – savings customers will be able to determine maturity dates and interest rates, through a competitive online fixed-interest savings range. This philosophy will also be applied to mortgages.

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Masthaven will give share options in the business to its employees, which will be majority-owned by founder and shareholder Andrew Bloom, with the remaining ownership held by the billionaire Pears family.

Bloom said: “We want our employees to hold a stake in the business that we will be building together, because as a bank we’re only as good as the people we employ. Our new team combines great talent and experiences with a shared vision to change banking for the better, working with our customers to help give them greater control of their finances.”

Economic secretary to the Treasury, Harriett Baldwin, said “Incentivising new banks to come to market is a key part of the government’s drive to increase competition in banking. We want to ensure that the UK financial services sector remains the best and most diverse in the world.”