Klarna wants to be more than the checkout button that lets shoppers split a purchase into installments. The Swedish fintech said it had applied to the Utah Department of Financial Institutions and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to establish its own US bank, to be called Klarna Bank USA, according to the company. It is a notable step in the company's push to turn its American business from a lending app into a bank.
What Klarna applied for
The specific target is an "industrial bank" charter, sometimes called an industrial loan company. This is a type of bank, chartered by a US state (here, Utah) and insured by the FDIC, that a non-bank parent company is allowed to own without the parent itself becoming a regulated bank holding company under Federal Reserve oversight, as the Utah regulator describes the category. That structure is why it appeals to a technology company like Klarna: it can own and run a real, deposit-taking bank while remaining, at the parent level, a payments and software firm.
FDIC insurance means customer deposits would be guaranteed by the federal government up to the standard limits, and the bank would be examined by regulators for safety and soundness. Today, Klarna offers its US banking-style products through partner banks that hold the deposits and issue the credit; its own charter would let it bring that in-house and control the whole relationship, the company said, per its statement. Klarna named Gary Harding, a former bank chief executive, to lead the new entity.
Why now
Klarna has been pushing hard into the United States and broadening beyond installment lending. The company listed on the New York Stock Exchange in September 2025, pricing its IPO at $40 a share and raising about $1.37 billion, CNBC reported, giving it public-company scale and capital. In the first quarter of 2026 it reported about $1 billion in revenue, up 44% from a year earlier, and said it now serves roughly 29 million US consumers, with its "banking" products growing especially fast, according to Klarna.
Owning a bank, rather than renting one, is the logical next step: it can be cheaper over time, it removes a middleman, and it lets Klarna offer a fuller set of accounts and products under its own brand. It also, as the company frames it, positions Klarna to compete more directly with traditional US banks.
The catch
A charter application is a beginning, not an approval. Industrial bank charters draw heavy regulatory scrutiny; the review by state and federal regulators can take many months, and there is no guarantee of success. Industrial banks also come with constraints on the kinds of accounts they can offer. And Klarna's core business, lending to consumers at the checkout, ties its fortunes to household spending and credit losses, which a banking license does not change.
Still, the direction is clear. A wave of fintech firms has sought to own banks rather than partner with them, trading the simplicity of a partnership for control and, they hope, better economics. Klarna's application puts it firmly in that camp, and marks how far a company that started by splitting up shoppers' payments now intends to go.
