Vault Launches Online Financial Platform for Small Businesses in Canada

Vault has launched an all-in-one online financial platform for small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) in Canada.

The platform is designed to give SMB owners access to financial products and services that are not easily available to them otherwise, Vault said in a Tuesday (May 16) press release.

“My co-founder, Saud Aziz, and I have parents who are small business owners, and we experienced first-hand the antiquated banking services that constrained their ability to freely manage how they spend, move and manage their money, all while enduring excessive fees,” Vault Co-founder Ahmed Shafik said in the release. “We founded Vault to change this.”

Through the Vault platform, SMB owners can access local accounts, real-time currency exchange, a Vault Prepaid Mastercard Card, 1% cash back on card purchases, spend management, free domestic and international bank transfers, accounting integrations to automate bookkeeping, and the ability to purchase investment products, according to the release.

Vault plans to add lending, savings products, payment automation and additional foreign exchange (FX) products by the end of the year, the release said.

The firm partners with regulated financial institutions (FIs) and enables clients to see which FI is holding their funds via the platform, per the release.

“Peoples has a strong history of working with Canadian FinTechs in helping drive innovation in the Canadian market,” Karen Budahazy, vice president of digital enablement and issuing at Peoples Group, said in the release. “Vault is a new and exciting financial platform for SMBs in Canada, and we look forward to helping their clients better manage their money through our partnership.”

Canadian SMBs have embraced open banking but want better access to digital tools, Mastercard said in February as Canada’s government was preparing to unveil its open banking framework.

Mastercard found that 65% of Canadian SMBs were generally in favor of open banking regulation and 80% said the country’s open banking framework should take their unique needs into account.

“Our latest research findings reinforce the message we keep hearing from small businesses across the country,” Darrell MacMullin, senior vice president of products and platforms at Mastercard Canada, said at the time. “They want better access to innovative, secure financial technology to take control of their finances, access new capital, and succeed.”