Saudi leadership approves license for new local digital bank

By Leandra Monteiro

His Excellency the Minister of Finance, Mohammed Al-Jadaan, and His Excellency the Governor of the Saudi Central Bank (SAMA), Fahad Almubarak expressed their gratitude and appreciation to the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud and His Royal Highness Mohammad bin Salman, the Crown Prince, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defense (May Allah protect them), for the Counsel of Ministers’ approval to license for a local digital bank in the name of “D360 Bank”.

The digital bank will be established with a capital of 1.65 billion Saudi Riyals through a consortium of individual and corporate investors, with the Public Investment Fund as one of the key investors and will be led by Derayah Financial Company. The establishment of D360 Bank comes as an extension of the continuous support of the Kingdom’s leadership towards various sectors, including the financial sector.

SAMA has been actively engaged in keeping pace with the latest developments in the financial industry to be in line with the objectives of the Financial Sector Development Program -one of the Saudi Vision 2030 programs- that seeks to develop the digital economy; enables financial institutions to support private sector growth and provides opportunities to new companies and start-ups to provide financial services. Furthermore, two local digital banks have been recently licensed to conduct banking business in the Kingdom and this is the third license for a local digital bank, which brings the total number of licensed banks in the Kingdom to (35) banks, including (11) local banks, (3) local digital banks, and (21) foreign bank branches.