KakaoBank Corp. (stylized as Kakaobank;

Hangul The Korean alphabet, known as Hangul, . Hangul may also be written as following South Korea's standard Romanization. ( ) in South Korea and Chosŏn'gŭl in North Korea, is the modern official writing system for the Korean language. The let ...

: 주식회사 카카오뱅크) is a South Korean mobile-only bank and

financial technology Fintech, a portmanteau of "financial technology", refers to firms using new technology to compete with traditional financial methods in the delivery of financial services. Artificial intelligence, blockchain, cloud computing, and big data are ...

company established in 2016 by Korea Investment Holdings and Kakao Corp.

History

The banking service went public in July 2017 after getting a huge spotlight mainly due to its simplicity and unique and intuitive UI and UX. The

bank A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. Because ...

attracted more than 240,000 customers within the first 24-hour-operation. The

mobile app A mobile application or app is a computer program or software application designed to run on a mobile device such as a phone, tablet, or watch. Mobile applications often stand in contrast to desktop applications which are designed to run on d ...

-based lender has achieved more than 10 million customers by July 11, 2019. As of March 31, 2021, Kakaobank's customer volume is more than 14.2 million.

Valuation

In October 2020, the corporate valuation of the South Korea’s largest neobank was set around KRW 8.6 trillion through KRW 750 billion-capital, raising from the U.S-based private equity TPG Capital and current shareholders.

IPO

On September 25, 2020, Kakaobank officially announced its

IPO An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investment ...

plan to public. The bank picked KB Security and

Credit Suisse Credit Suisse Group AG is a global investment bank and financial services firm founded and based in Switzerland. Headquartered in Zürich, it maintains offices in all major financial centers around the world and is one of the nine global " ...

as lead managers for its IPO, with

Citi Citigroup Inc. or Citi (stylized as citi) is an American multinational investment bank and financial services corporation headquartered in New York City. The company was formed by the merger of banking giant #Citicorp, Citicorp and financial ...

as a co-manager. According to a local media report, kakaobank would submit the IPO application to a Korean exchange on April 15, 2021.

Top Management

kakaobank has been heading by co-CEO Lee Yong-woo and Yun Ho-young, who are renowned experts in, respectively,

finance Finance is the study and discipline of money, currency and capital assets. It is related to, but not synonymous with economics, the study of production, distribution, and consumption of money, assets, goods and services (the discipline of fina ...

and ICT in South Korea. Lee had worked as a finance strategist and an

investment Investment is the dedication of money to purchase of an asset to attain an increase in value over a period of time. Investment requires a sacrifice of some present asset, such as time, money, or effort. In finance, the purpose of investing i ...

expert in financial industry. Prior to head kakaobank, Lee worked as CIO at Korea Investment Management and head of strategy and planning department at Korea Investment Holdings. Lee holds PhD in economics from Seoul National University. Yun set up a task-force team to create kakaobank when he was working in Kakao Corp. in 2015. Prior to kakaobank, Yun had also worked as senior management at

Daum Communications Kakao ( ko, 카카오) is a South Korean internet company that was established in 2010. It formed as a result of a merger between Daum Communications and the original Kakao Inc. In 2014, the company was renamed Daum Kakao. The company rebrande ...

, South Korea's

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

portal, and ERGO daumdirect, a joint venture direct

insurance Insurance is a means of protection from financial loss in which, in exchange for a fee, a party agrees to compensate another party in the event of a certain loss, damage, or injury. It is a form of risk management, primarily used to hedge ...

seller in South Korea. Yun has graduated from

HanYang University Hanyang University (Korean: 한양대학교) is a private research university in South Korea. The main campus is located in Seoul and its satellite campus, the Education Research Industry Cluster (ERICA campus), is in Ansan. ''Hanyang'' (한양, ...

Seoul Seoul (; ; ), officially known as the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea.Before 1972, Seoul was the ''de jure'' capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) as stated iArticle 103 ...

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

with a

bachelor A bachelor is a man who is not and has never been married.Bachelors are, in Pitt & al.'s phrasing, "men who live independently, outside of their parents' home and other institutional settings, who are neither married nor cohabitating". (). Etymo ...

of management. In March 2020, the bank said its board has decided to keep Yun as a sole

CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

after Lee had resigned in January seeking to run for

lawmaker A legislator (also known as a deputy or lawmaker) is a person who writes and passes laws, especially someone who is a member of a legislature. Legislators are often elected by the people of the state. Legislatures may be supra-national (for ex ...

. In March 2021, the bank's board of directors approved the extension of Yun's another two-year term.

Services

kakaobank's services include

loan In finance, a loan is the lending of money by one or more individuals, organizations, or other entities to other individuals, organizations, etc. The recipient (i.e., the borrower) incurs a debt and is usually liable to pay interest on that d ...

, deposit,

debit card A debit card, also known as a check card or bank card is a payment card that can be used in place of cash to make purchases. The term '' plastic card'' includes the above and as an identity document. These are similar to a credit card, but u ...

, overseas remittance and some other financial services.

App

kakaobank provides products via its

s which adopt easy identification (KYC) methods. kakaobank's UI and UX are considered very intuitive. In July 2019, kakaobank's Android app was recognized as No.1 banking app based on MAU and the most downloaded banking app in the country by igaoworks.

References

External links

* �
Official website(English)
{{Kakao Kakao Online banks South Korean companies established in 2016 Banks established in 2016 Banks of South Korea