The new company, called Greenwood, has secured funding from private investors as it seeks to create banking services specifically for underserved people of color.

Greenwood will work with a partner bank to bring in FDIC insured savings and spending accounts. Users will have access to Apple, Samsung and Android Pay, virtual debit cards, P2P transfers, mobile check deposits and free use of ATMs in more than 30,000 locations.

The brainchild of former Atlanta Young Mayor Killer Mike, a member of Run the Jewels – aka Michael Render – and Bounce TV network founder Ryan Glover, Greenwood is named after the successful “Black Wall Street”, which was part of the Greenwood District in Tulsa, Oklahoma, during the turn of the 20th century.

The launch comes as the Black Lives Matter movement is forcing financial services companies to grapple with their role in the racial wealth gap in the United States. This week, JPMorgan Chase made a $ 30 billion pledge to help tackle wealth inequality through loans, investments and philanthropy.

Says Glover, “It’s no secret that traditional banks have let down the Black and Latinx community. We needed to create a new financial platform that understands our history and future needs, a banking platform built by us and for us, a platform that helps build a stronger future for our communities. “

While digital, Greenwood said he plans to work with minority brick-and-mortar banks to provide deposits to strengthen historically black banks.

It will also support the community in three ways:

• For each customer registration, Greenwood will provide five free meals to a family in need.
• Each pass of a Greenwood debit card will result in a donation to UNCF for education, Goodr to feed the hungry, or NAACP to support civil rights.
• And each month, Greenwood will offer a grant of $ 10,000 to a Black or Latinx small business owner who is a customer of Greenwood.

Greenwood has assembled a management team that includes BofA vet Aparicio Giddins and former Green Dot man David Tapscott. Both are black, a fact noted by Killer Mike, who took the opportunity to take a look at Wells Fargo CEO Charles Scharf, who recently claimed “that there is a very limited pool of black talent among which to recruit “.

NOT that me lol! Ryan Glover, Paul Judge, Andy and his son Bo Young and all those Black Banking and Finance guys their Prez of Wells Fargo can’t find but exist. ?? #BankGreenwood https://t.co/XYZ0kKID82

– Killer Mike (@KillerMike) October 8, 2020