The Toronto-based fintech, which has over 400,000 monthly users, is offering U.S. clients an account with no fees and is looking to expand the program into Canada. (The Logic)

Talking point: Wave is the latest Canadian fintech to offer a bank account, following Wealthsimple, Neo Financial and Shopify, but CEO Kirk Simpson is confident its offering will stand out from the crowd. “We are the first product to come out with small-business banking and bookkeeping tied together seamlessly,” Simpson told The Logic. “Shopify has announced it but it’s not coming until the fall. We’ve already got users, and we’re excited to ramp that up.” Simpson said the initial U.S. focus is partially due to a less friendly regulatory environment in Canada, which also caused problems when Wave offered to distribute government COVID-19 aid. “We have a tremendous amount of data about our small business customers, in some ways more than what the banks see. And yet there’s been a reticence in Canada to open it up,” said Simpson. “We know in the U.S. that players like QuickBooks and Square and others are distributing funds. And in Canada it’s been a, quite frankly, frustrating experience to try and help.”