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Met Zach at the ST holiday party through a mutual acquaintance. I found him to be quite upbeat and aware of the challenges that are omnipresent in infrastructur

Met Zach at the ST holiday party through a mutual acquaintance. I found him to be quite upbeat and aware of the challenges that are omnipresent in infrastructure businesses (source: I'm deeply involved in an infrastructure business involving a horse of a different color). One must bet big to win when it comes to infrastructure games. For standard treasury, I believe that becoming a bank is a logical step and one that I would welcome wholeheartedly. There are so many things about the current monoliths I deal with that I hate and I feel like it's entirely possible for almost anyone to deliver a better experience. They're in a hard place right now though. I don't think ST has any revenues to speak of and they don't appear to have raised any money post-YC. This is a business I really want to succeed but it seems unlikely to do so without a major cash infusion. I really like zt but they're in a hard place with no shelter in sight. To put this in perspective, you probably need about $50M to start a chartered bank and you probably need $20-30M to buy a distressed one. Those are not ridiculous numbers for the kinds of returns this could have, but a bank will never have 97% margins as a business and so I don't know if this is a venture backable business. Now, a fund with longer time horizons... That might be interesting. Edit: For the sake of clarity, I want to be explicit when I say that I'm pulling for standard treasury. It's a hard business and I really want them to succeed because I think it would be a net-benefit to almost all of us.

zt 13y ago
Thanks for the encouragement Josh! We raised a round post-YC. Oh, and we have revenue too. We're up to eight people and have a long runway. Buying a bank would take a different sort of capital though. One has to think about working with PE/hedge funds (some of whom have already bought banks) or even sovereign wealth.
- josephjrobison 13y ago
  From the consumer point of view, as a startup bank I think it would be important to guarantee to the users that you'll accept no buyout offers from big banks for 5 years, and then renew that commitment every 5 years or something. It might be a crazy idea and maybe those who don't like big banks just are more vocal about it, but a lot of people are afraid of trusting a new system that can be gone any day or snapped up by a monolith that they were trying to avoid.
- josh2600 13y ago
  Hey Zach! That's funny, I couldn't find your post-YC round anywhere on the interwebs or CrunchBase. You've done a great job keeping that under wraps (also the revenue piece, WOW!). I'm excited for you guys and look forward to banking through you in the future. I agree that sovereigns would be interesting (as would PE/hedge) and I'll point out that we have many of the largest fund of funds on the planet in the bay area (within spitting distance of your office actually). Best of luck and I look forward to seeing your team prosper in the future.
pbreit 13y ago
Business Insider reported $10+ million run rate: http://www.businessinsider.com/y-combinator-startup-standard-treasury-creating-api-for-banks-2013-7 http://www.businessinsider.com/y-combinator-startup-standard... Edit: from "ST stated" to "BI reported"
- zt 13y ago
  I wouldn't call that article the most accurate written about Standard Treasury.

zt 13y ago

Thanks for the encouragement Josh! We raised a round post-YC. Oh, and we have revenue too. We're up to eight people and have a long runway. Buying a bank would take a different sort of capital though. One has to think about working with PE/hedge funds (some of whom have already bought banks) or even sovereign wealth.

josephjrobison 13y ago
From the consumer point of view, as a startup bank I think it would be important to guarantee to the users that you'll accept no buyout offers from big banks for 5 years, and then renew that commitment every 5 years or something. It might be a crazy idea and maybe those who don't like big banks just are more vocal about it, but a lot of people are afraid of trusting a new system that can be gone any day or snapped up by a monolith that they were trying to avoid.
josh2600 13y ago
Hey Zach! That's funny, I couldn't find your post-YC round anywhere on the interwebs or CrunchBase. You've done a great job keeping that under wraps (also the revenue piece, WOW!). I'm excited for you guys and look forward to banking through you in the future. I agree that sovereigns would be interesting (as would PE/hedge) and I'll point out that we have many of the largest fund of funds on the planet in the bay area (within spitting distance of your office actually). Best of luck and I look forward to seeing your team prosper in the future.

pbreit 13y ago

Business Insider reported $10+ million run rate: http://www.businessinsider.com/y-combinator-startup-standard-treasury-creating-api-for-banks-2013-7 http://www.businessinsider.com/y-combinator-startup-standard... Edit: from "ST stated" to "BI reported"

zt 13y ago
I wouldn't call that article the most accurate written about Standard Treasury.