Bunq is, after Revolut, Europe’s second-largest neobank and, as such, has announced that it has opened its first branch in Italy and is introducing a local IBAN for its users.
Founded in 2012 in Amsterdam by entrepreneur Ali Niknam (pictured above), Bunq is used by over 20 million customers across Europe and operates in more than 30 markets. It was the first bank to obtain a new ‘greenfield’ banking licence in over 35 years and the first EU neobank to achieve profitability – according to a company statement – on a quarterly basis in 2022 and then annually in 2024. Bunq is built on generative artificial intelligence, having redesigned its infrastructure around AI to offer maximum value to its users with features such as instant voice translation in 38 languages, image recognition and smart budgeting tools.
In recent years, Italy has seen its community of digital nomads and international workers grow rapidly – with Milan, Rome and Florence topping the list of preferred destinations, according to a report by the Ministry of Labour and Social Policies. And with almost a million Italians having adopted this lifestyle, living, working and travelling across multiple countries has now become the norm. With this move, Bunq offers a global and flexible banking solution, enabling users to manage their money in a simple and intuitive way, wherever life, work and travel take them.
With the launch of the local IBAN, Italy has become Bunq’s new key market in Europe. Users will now be able to use an Italian IBAN alongside the other five European IBANs (the Netherlands, Germany, France, Spain and Ireland), managing every aspect of their financial life in a single app. Each account is fully functional, with its own IBAN, and organised into dedicated ‘pockets’ for rent, travel, subscriptions, savings or extra projects.
“Having spent years travelling between Italy and other countries, I know full well what it’s like to deal with bureaucracy when everything seems more complicated than it needs to be,” says Bianca Zwart, Bunq’s chief strategy officer, in a statement. “Italy deserves a way of managing money that matches its own desire to move forward. With the Italian IBAN, we want to offer a truly global experience thanks to an account that works everywhere but also speaks the language of home.”
With growth of 200% in Italy over the past year, the announcement follows Bunq’s recent expansion into North America, marked by the approval of its broker-dealer licence and the application for a ‘de novo’ licence in the United States, alongside the most recent licence application submitted in Mexico.
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