‘Let’s bank’: How MariBank plans to win over Singapore’s retail and SME segments

[SINGAPORE] When Natalia Goh joined Sea’s digital bank MariBank, the first question she often got was: how do you pronounce it?

“Mari”, inspired by the first word in the Singapore national anthem, means “come” or “let’s”.

“The thinking behind MariBank is actually let’s bank… a very welcoming message about how we make banking very accessible and simple,” Goh told The Business Times.

Since taking over as CEO in July 2024 – prior to that she was chief operating officer at Trust Bank – Goh has steered the digital bank’s strategy towards underserved segments, offering no-frills retail savings accounts for consumers frustrated with tiered interest rates at traditional banks.

To support SMEs that often struggled to get loans from traditional banks due to a limited operating history or needing smaller loan amounts, MariBank introduced revolving credit lines.

The numbers reflect MariBank’s growth in the market. Since its launch in March 2023, net interest income (NII) has risen steadily, jumping to S$22.2 million in FY2024 from S$9.8 million the year before. This was driven by credit products such as credit cards, rolled out in July 2024, and instant consumer loans introduced in March 2024.

As lending ramped up, allowances for expected credit losses rose from S$286,000 in FY2023 to S$4.4 million in FY2024.

Building on its experience serving SMEs, MariBank has expanded into term loans with larger loan quantums. As a result, lending has grown, and total assets more than doubled from S$956.6 million in FY2023 to S$2.3 billion in FY2024.

“You’re going to keep seeing that momentum now that we have also launched the consumer lending side of things,” said Goh.

MariBank has tapped synergies with other Sea business units, particularly e-commerce platform Shopee. By embedding its services within the platform such as offering consumers extra Shopee loyalty points for using a MariBank savings account or card at checkout, the digital bank has driven customer acquisition across both consumers and SMEs.

For SMEs on Shopee’s platform, data sharing between the platform and MariBank has allowed for more accurate underwriting of loans. This allows the digital bank to better understand the seller’s business.

“We may be more willing to underwrite you compared to some other traditional banks,” said Goh.

Consumers also gained from this data sharing, with MariBank better able to understand a consumer’s profile for underwriting and risk management. Personalisation and ad targeting also benefited from data sharing.

Beyond these synergies, being part of the Sea Group has also given MariBank access to the group’s broader tech expertise. This includes leveraging an artificial intelligence-powered anti-money laundering system, which enhances the bank’s ability to conduct risk profiling on potential borrowers.

“Because of the technology base that we have, that’s… allowed us to roll out things very quickly in terms of our product cycles, our speed to market,” said Goh.

For example, MariBank’s investment product lowered the barrier to entry by allowing users to start investing with as little as S$1 compared to typical minimum sums of S$100 or S$1,000. “Because of that, we’ve been able to scale in a way that we can facilitate this level of transactions – even though the ticket size is so small,” she explained.

While MariBank is currently restricted to onboarding retail customers within the Sea ecosystem under the terms of its digital bank licence, no such limitation applies to its SME business. Initially, most of its SME customers were Shopee merchants, but the mix has since shifted, with a growing share coming from outside the Shopee ecosystem.

The bank has reached out to these SMEs through both organic as well as marketing efforts. Goh noted that while some signed up after having encountered MariBank as retail customers, others came through targeted outreach aimed at raising awareness of the bank’s offerings.

MariBank is on track to profitability, and is currently in the phase of building that foundation so that its operations will be sustainable… “whether it’s across how we’re growing the customer base, the kind of products we’re rolling out, how we’re managing our costs, how we’re doing risk management”, said Goh.

In the next 12 months, there will be more products and services for both retail and SME customers. Recently, a cross-border remittance service was launched for both retail and SME customers, across 13 countries and 10 currencies.

“We’ll look to expand that service as well. And I think in this space which are payments related, that’s where we also hear… of certain needs from our users… both SME and consumers,” said Goh.

Goh’s focus now is on keeping MariBank true to its mission. Unlike emerging markets such as Indonesia or the Philippines, where large segments of the population remain unbanked, Singapore presents the opposite challenge – nearly everyone already has a bank account.

In making banking accessible, MariBank is also looking to bring value to Singapore as a digital bank and remain relevant amid competition from rival digital banks and incumbent banks. “We make sure we are serving underserved needs, and doing it differently,” said Goh.