Revolut has been granted an unrestricted Authorised Deposit-taking Institution (ADI) licence by the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority, launching Revolut Bank Australia on 21 July 2026 as the first global fintech to hold a full ADI licence and the company’s first licensed bank in APAC.
The launch is backed by a commitment to invest close to AUD$400 million in the Australian market over five years, directed at product development, growth and expanding its local workforce.
Revolut’s more than one million Australian retail customers, along with its business clients, will move automatically into the licensed entity, with eligible deposits protected up to AUD$250,000 per account holder under the Financial Claims Scheme.
From travel card to full bank
Revolut entered the Australian market in 2020 under an Australian Financial Services Licence, initially offering a multi-currency card.
The ADI licence lets it take deposits and lend on the same regulatory footing as incumbent banks. Day-one products include instant-access savings accounts for retail and business customers, paying up to 5.05% a year with daily interest, and a retail credit card.
The licence extends a run of banking authorisations for Revolut, which secured its full UK licence in March and holds banking permissions in the EEA and Mexico, with a US application filed. Matt Baxby, chief executive of Revolut Bank Australia, said the licence enables the company to expand into a broader suite of products.
An independent analyst sees room for the challenge. Matthew Wilson, an analyst at investment group Jarden, that Revolut was “well placed” to disrupt Australian banking in credit and savings in a similar way to Macquarie, pointing to its record in markets such as Ireland. Macquarie’s growth in high-interest savings and transaction accounts has already shown a digital offering can take share from the majors.
Australia remains a hard market for challengers. The four major banks hold around 70% of banking assets, based on APRA’s monthly ADI statistics.
Earlier digital entrants did not last: Xinja handed back its ADI licence and returned all deposits in early 2021, and 86 400 sold itself to NAB the same year. Revolut enters with more than one million existing local customers, a base neither challenger built.
Zip retreats as NSW sets a payments roadmap
The licence landed in a week of movement across Australian payments. Zip, the ASX-listed buy now, pay later provider, announced an orderly wind-down of its New Zealand operations on 17 July to concentrate investment on Australia and the US, where it says growth is profitable. Its shares fell 6.3% on the announcement.
On 22 July, the NSW Government published its first Payments Strategy, a blueprint built around real-time payments, fraud resilience and digital government services, positioning the state as a driver of national payments modernisation.
Regulatory uncertainty persists at the federal level. With 71 days until Australia’s card surcharge ban takes effect, the RBA has clarified parts of the framework but left interchange rates and exemptions unresolved, leaving merchants without final pricing detail as the deadline approaches.
