NAB Buys Banked to Speed Up Merchant Payments, Bypassing Cards

Banked’s platform plugs into a merchant’s checkout, letting customers pay directly from their bank accounts without entering card details. The consumer is redirected to their bank’s app or online portal to authenticate, and the funds move instantly via the bank-to-bank settlement rails. For the merchant, the transaction fee is typically far lower than a card payment – often a flat fee of a few cents rather than a percentage of the sale. NAB can now integrate this directly into its merchant acquiring services, potentially offering it as a differentiated product to its business clients. The acquisition bypasses the lengthy process of building similar capability in-house and gives NAB immediate expertise in open banking compliance and user experience. Although financial terms were not disclosed, the strategic price likely reflects the time saved and the pre-built regulatory approvals Banked holds under UK and European open banking frameworks.

The Sector Read-Through: A2A Payments as a Competitive Wedge

This move crystallises a trend that has been simmering across global banking: the shift toward account-to-account payments as a weapon against card network fees. In Australia, the major banks have historically dominated merchant acquiring, however their pricing power has been eroded by fintech acquirers like Square and Stripe. NAB’s acquisition signals a counter-punch – using lower-cost rails to win back merchant loyalty on fees. If successful, it could pressure other Australian banks to accelerate their own pay-by-bank offerings, either through acquisitions or by leveraging the existing New Payments Platform (NPP) infrastructure. The response may not be uniform; some banks may see the NPP’s real-time payments capability as sufficient and avoid acquisition costs. The read-through for the sector is that the cost of accepting payments is set to decline, and the banks that move fastest on A2A could gain market share while those that hesitate risk losing volume to more agile fintechs.

The immediate catalyst for investors is NAB’s disclosure of integration milestones and any pilot merchant partners. The technology must scale across the bank’s large commercial base to materially impact earnings. Announcements of live merchants and transaction volumes will be the real proof. The next sector read-through trigger would be a rival bank announcing a partnership or acquisition in the A2A space. Until then, the acquisition is a strategic signal rather than an immediate earnings mover. The broader market for payment infrastructure is evolving, and deals like this show where the puck is heading. For ongoing updates on how infrastructure shifts affect stocks, see our stock market analysis.