Plata strengthens its path to operating as a bank: new CFO and a push for cheaper funding to reach profitability

With a banking license in hand, Plata is looking to turn scale and technology into profits, supported by deposits and tighter risk controls.

Plata is accelerating its transition from a fintech to a banking institution with a clear goal: to reach profitability this year, now backed by a license that opens the door to taking deposits from the public and expanding its product offering. In that context, the company appointed Marcos Kantt as Chief Financial Officer (CFO), an executive with nearly 20 years of experience in investment banking and a background at firms such as Bank of America and Credit Suisse, as well as a stint at Habi.

The move comes at a time when Mexico’s financial system remains challenging: interest rates are still relatively high by recent historical standards, competition for customers and deposits is intense, and compliance and control requirements are more demanding. For newer institutions, the dilemma is usually the same: grow fast enough to dilute fixed costs without hurting credit quality or driving up user acquisition costs.

With around 3.5 million customers, Plata says its strategy to get into the black rests on three fronts: launching new products, lowering its funding cost, and increasing operating leverage—meaning spreading fixed costs over a growing base of users and transactions. The company expects that between April and May its customers will be able to access debit products at scale, a meaningful lever because banking becomes more efficient when a significant portion of funding comes from deposits.

In an interview, Kantt said the priority will be to separate “aspirational profitability” from “real” profitability, which in execution terms means calibrating growth to a scale that covers fixed costs and the development of new products. The company expects to keep investing for at least the next 24 months, though it has not disclosed amounts or publicly defined whether it will pursue new capital rounds, after a sizable raise was reported late last year.

The CFO appointment also aims to strengthen internal processes and controls. In a bank, financial discipline goes beyond budgets: it involves capital management, regulatory reporting, liquidity management, credit policies, and corporate governance. Kantt has said his role will be to institutionalize and formalize processes that are already in place—an approach that’s typical when a company moves from a high-growth stage to one where the market demands consistency and operational resilience.

On the commercial front, Plata emphasizes that it wants to grow without expanding credit indiscriminately. The company reports an approval rate near 20%, a figure that suggests stricter filters than some volume-oriented competitors. It also notes that a portion of its users—around 15%—had never had a credit card before, which makes financial education and the design of limits and products that reduce the likelihood of over-indebtedness especially important.

Financial inclusion as an opportunity and a challenge in Mexico

Plata’s bet is playing out in a country where financial inclusion is improving but still uneven. Mexico’s 2024 National Survey of Financial Inclusion (ENIF) reports that about 23% of the population does not have any financial product. That gap creates room for low-cost digital models, especially in segments where traditional banking has lower penetration or where credit history is limited. However, turning “inclusion” into a sustainable business often requires a robust risk architecture, fraud prevention, efficient customer support costs, and savings and payments products that make the customer relationship recurring.

For new entrants, taking deposits and offering debit accounts can improve net interest margin, but it also means competing directly for trust. In Mexico, deposits tend to be concentrated in large banks; breaking that inertia requires clear value propositions, reputation, service, and transparency around fees. At the same time, the macro backdrop—with moderate growth, consumption that remains resilient in some segments, and an investment agenda shaped by nearshoring, infrastructure, and security—could favor players that connect payments, savings, and credit with merchants and supply chains.

Looking ahead, Plata’s challenge will be to execute its transition smoothly: complete the rollout of products, secure competitively priced funding, keep delinquencies under control, and sustain the technology investment needed to automate processes. With a base of more than 800 engineers, the company is betting that in-house development will lower unit costs and improve the user experience, but the market will judge results using traditional banking metrics: margin, operating efficiency, portfolio quality, deposit growth, and regulatory compliance.

In sum, the arrival of Marcos Kantt and the formal start of Plata’s banking phase put the company to a key test: turning digital scale into profitability through deposits, risk control, and operating discipline, in a Mexico where financial inclusion remains an opportunity—but also an execution challenge.