Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon says the launch of its co-branded card with Apple is just "the beginning" of the firm's efforts to be as big on Main Street as it is on Wall Street.
In an internal staff memo sent out on the day that Apple launched its credit card, Solomon lauded the project as a milestone for the consumer business and the firm.
"We’ve been in business for 150 years, but Main Street banking is new for us," says Solomon. "Our partnership with Apple will accelerate customer-centric innovation in the credit card industry and is a testament to the remarkable progress we’ve made in just a few years through Marcus, a growing disruptor in consumer financial services."
Goldman's online consumer brand Marcus currently counts $5 billion in loan balances, more than $50 billion in deposits and 4 million customers.
Solomon says the disruptive transformation seen with Marcus is also apparent with the Apple launch.
"Apple Card makes a typically frustrating application process easy; it provides an interface with more useful information for the customer; and it places greater importance on customer privacy and security," he says. "As a beta user for the last few months, I’m a happy customer and use the card all the time both through Apple Pay and the titanium physical card."
Apple Card is big, but it’s also a beginning, he writes.
"With no real legacy technology or a longstanding consumer business to defend, we are positioned to innovate unlike many others in the industry," Solomon concludes. "In the decades to come, I expect us to be a leader in our consumer business, just like we are in our institutional and corporate businesses, with customer-centricity at the core of everything we do."