I’ve some friends that works there, so I’m hesitant to say this, because I’m sorry for them, but Plaid is a terrible company. Their main product scrapes financial data from unsuspecting users that simply think they’re making a bank transfer and not signing away the privacy and security of their banking, 401k and trading information.<p><a href="https://twitter.com/seanieb/status/1298871471645761537?s=20" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/seanieb/status/1298871471645761537?s=20</a>
It would have gone through had Visa's CEO not been so honest at the time of the merger announcement saying that they intended to use Plaid's data to get a leg up on their competitors.<p>> The DOJ cited Visa CEO Al Kelly’s description of the deal as an “insurance policy” to neutralize a “threat to our important US debit business.”
Whatever you think about Visa or this merger, this would be a major disappoint to Plaid's team members who thought they were in for a huge financial windfall.<p>If that applies to anyone here, my sympathies and best of luck figuring out what's next for Plaid. Hopefully the morale hit isn't too big on the team.
That Visa isn't fighting this should validate that the government's antitrust enforcement has been lax. For a merger valued in billions of dollars, hiring even the best lawyers for a long fight would have been a rounding error. The only way this happens is for Visa's lawyers to think that the government would likely win.
Finally some antitrust enforcement!<p>This was clearly going to be anti competitive and bad for consumers.<p>Plaid has a great product and will either spac / ipo or be a great acquisition target for someone else.
Important to note that there is no break-up fee that Visa (or Plaid) will pay.<p>Source: <a href="https://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2021/01/12/visa-ends-its-5-3-billion-bid-for-fintech-plaid.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2021/01/12/vis...</a>
I'm surprised by this. I used to work in Foster City.<p>The joke on the campus was that VISA stood for "Very Inconspicuous Spy Agency".<p>You'd think that there wouldn't be this kind of miscommunication in the chain of command.<p>All jokes aside, I'm very curious to check out Plaid now because I didn't pay attention when it was independent and Visa is a *very* smart organization, so Plaid must be something special.
My guess is that that Plaid will go public via a SPAC deal now. I think it's highly likely GSAH (Goldman Sachs Acquisition Holdings) is that SPAC that does a deal. They have $750M to play with and given Visa was going to buy Plaid for $5.3B, the numbers kind of make sense.
There's a decent bit of M&A activity going on in finanacial services lately- SoFi recently announced going public, Simple being dissolved after BBVA merging with PNC, Lending Club merging with Radius Bank, and now Plaid's merger termination with Visa. Lots more demand exists for building fintech tools, since significantly more transactions that would normally take place in-person have moved towards being online due to the pandemic. It makes a lot more sense for the whole ecosystem to move towards being data-driven and API-friendly both for consumers to to have less friction between services, and for businesses to deliver a better customer experience. Having the merger fall through is probably better on all sides such that one corporation doesn't retain too much power and act as monopolistic gatekeeper driving up fee prices.<p>Also, wanted to say thanks to Zach for doing a Fireside Chat with Lambda School students last month! It's great to hear from your perspective about industry knowledge & experience in order to prepare for a career in tech.
Guess this is related:<p>Plaid blog post 'The Year Ahead' <a href="https://plaid.com/blog/the-year-ahead/" rel="nofollow">https://plaid.com/blog/the-year-ahead/</a>
(<a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25754256" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25754256</a>)
I gave them access to my bank via coinbase. If I change my bank password would they lose access to my account? If not, what do I need to do to make Plaid lose my banking access?
Plaid acquired a direct competitor Quovo in 2019 for $200m. I am sensing a trend.<p><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/plaid-acquires-quovo-2019-1" rel="nofollow">https://www.businessinsider.com/plaid-acquires-quovo-2019-1</a>
Their link to delete data for CA residents: <a href="https://plaid.com/legal/data-protection-request-form/" rel="nofollow">https://plaid.com/legal/data-protection-request-form/</a>
I am surprised Plaid is a business. It is a bunch of scripts of dubious security. How businesses are coming on board with that is worrisome.<p>On the other hand, if we could have standard API and let people integrate services, totally welcome that. But let's not pretend this is anything like that.<p>If you know something more, please educate me.