A US neobank's revenue on a remittance is a transfer fee, a markup on the exchange rate, or both, while card interchange and subscriptions elsewhere in the account cover part of the cost. Chime reports no remittance revenue, so Remitly, a transfer app, is the closest public proxy.
How do US neobanks earn on a transfer abroad?
Five lines can sit behind a send-money button, and a given app usually leans on two. The first two are the transfer itself. The other three are earned elsewhere in the account, and they decide how hard the transfer has to work.
The five revenue lines behind a US neobank's transfer feature, and what the sources say about each.
Revenue line | Who pays | What sets it | What the sources say |
Transfer fee | The sender | Corridor, funding method, delivery method and amount | Remitly's 10-K lists those four drivers for its transaction fees |
FX markup | The sender, inside the rate | Gap between the rate offered and the rate the provider buys at | Remitly's 10-K defines its spread the same way |
Debit card interchange | The merchant, through its bank | Card spend and the issuer's size | Regulation II caps it for issuers with $10 billion or more in assets; Chime's Payments revenue, which its 10-K ties to card interchange, was 68.6% of 2025 revenue |
Instant-transfer and subscription fees | The user | Speed or tier | Chime booked $38.0 million of outbound instant transfer fees in 2025 |
Interest on balances | The bank holding the money | Balance size and rate | Chime's 10-K describes savings as offered through bank partners |
The last row matters for anyone assuming float pays for the account. In a sponsor-bank model the interest belongs to whoever holds the balances, and a neobank sees it only if its contract passes some of it on.
The FX markup is the line senders cannot see
A transfer fee is printed on the screen. A markup lives inside the exchange rate, so it shows up only when the sender compares the amount the recipient gets against a reference rate. Remitly's 10-K for 2025 defines its spread as the difference between the rate it offers customers and the rate on its own currency purchases, and says the spread comes out of proprietary models.
That is why an app can advertise a transfer with no fee and still earn on it. It is also why promotions look like a cost line. The same 10-K says waived fees and better first-transfer rates are booked as reductions of revenue, so a free first transfer is an acquisition cost the app chooses to carry.
In the United States, the Remittance Transfer Rule decides what the sender must be shown before paying. It does not set what the app may earn, and the disclosure fields are in the Remittance Transfer Rule post. Sending money for others is also regulated activity in its own right, and FinCEN registration is a separate duty from the disclosure screen.
On Lumx, a locked quote returns a base and a final exchange rate and target amount. The gap between them is the Lumx fee plus the partner fee, plus a lock fee on a one or five minute lock, with no FX margin built in, so the amount the sender confirms is the one the payout converts at, before any fee the recipient's bank charges.
What the filings show per dollar sent
Two public companies show the two sides of this economy. Chime is a US neobank whose accounts run on bank partners, and its 10-K has no remittance line. Remitly is a remittance app, closer to the transfer than to the account, so it is the nearest public proxy for what a transfer earns. We found no US neobank that reports remittance revenue as its own line.
Revenue mix and delivery cost from the 2025 annual reports. Percentages are computed from the figures in each 10-K.
Measure, year ended December 31, 2025 | Chime | Remitly |
Total revenue | $2,186.8 million | $1,635.1 million |
Largest revenue line | Payments, tied to card interchange: $1,500.6 million, 68.6% of revenue | Transaction fees and FX spreads, described as the substantial majority of revenue |
Other revenue | Platform-related: $686.2 million, 31.4% | Remitly Flex, Wallet and card products |
Send volume | Not reported | $74.9 billion |
Revenue per dollar sent | Not applicable | 2.18% |
Transaction expenses | Cost of revenue: $263.0 million | $549.5 million, 33.6% of revenue and 0.73% of send volume |
Remitly's 2.18% is the all-in take on money sent. It is a company-wide average across corridors and funding methods, so no single transfer earns exactly that. Its transaction expenses are the delivery bill: fees paid to disbursement partners, fees to payment processors that fund the transfer, provisions for transaction losses, chargebacks, fraud prevention and compliance tools. Roughly a third of what the app takes goes straight back out before marketing, support or technology.
Chime shows what a card-led neobank looks like instead. Payments revenue, which the 10-K ties to debit and credit card interchange, is more than two thirds of the total, and the 10-K says that if its bank partners became subject to the Durbin limits, payments revenue could suffer. In that model, a transfer feature is a reason to keep the account, and it does not have to carry the business alone.
What does sending money abroad usually cost the sender?
The CFPB's October 2018 Remittance Rule Assessment Report puts the average cost of a $200 transfer at roughly $8 to $18 depending on the destination, which is 4% to 9% of the amount (our arithmetic). Its data is from 2014 and 2017, so read it as a range and not as today's price. Remitly's 2.18% take on $74.9 billion sent in 2025 is lower than that band, but it is one company's average across corridors. The fee is also not the whole price. The CFPB's Circular 2024-02, dated March 27, 2024, says calling a transfer free can be deceptive when the provider imposes costs through the exchange rate spread.
On Lumx, the neobank sets the partner fee, in basis points, a flat amount or both, separately for deposits and payouts. Lumx publishes no rates, so the price the sender sees is the neobank's choice.
Why interchange can change how a neobank prices transfers
Debit interchange is capped by 12 CFR 235.3 at 21 cents plus 5 basis points of the transaction value, with a one-cent fraud-prevention adjustment for eligible issuers under 235.4. Issuers that hold less than $10 billion in assets with their affiliates are exempt under 235.5, which is why so many neobanks issue through smaller partner banks.
The Federal Reserve's table for 2024 shows the gap. Covered transactions earned an average of 23 cents, 0.47% of an average $48.95 purchase. Exempt transactions earned 51 cents, 1.21% of an average $42.27 purchase. A neobank on an exempt bank earns more than twice as much per swipe, and in our reading that difference leaves room to price a transfer low. Card economics are covered in the debit card post for US neobanks, and the rest of this post stays on the transfer.
I would pick the line that carries the transfer feature before picking its fee. If the card already pays for the account, I price the transfer low and treat it as retention. If it does not, I make the transfer cover its own delivery cost and show the sender the amount the recipient gets before they confirm, because senders compare that number across apps and a markup they find only by comparing is one they eventually leave over.
What a remittance costs the neobank to deliver
The delivery bill splits into costs per transfer and costs per user. Per transfer: the payout partner, the funding method, and losses from fraud. Per user: identity checks, plus support and compliance work, which land on senders who never send. Remitly's 33.6% covers only the first group, so the second sits on top.
The practical rule is to compute contribution per funded sender, not per signup: a sender who verifies and never funds costs a check and earns nothing. For the supplier-side view of what a provider keeps, see how stablecoin payout pricing works.
On Lumx the model is a monthly platform fee plus usage-based per-transaction fees, transparent FX on locked quotes, and no published plans. There is no pre-funding either: the neobank does not park capital in settlement accounts before a transfer, because conversion and settlement happen when the transfer starts. The standard agreement has a monthly minimum, and a ramp-up period waives it in the first months. Lumx does not deduct a fee from the amount that reaches the recipient on a Pix (Brazil's instant payment system, run by the Central Bank), SPEI (Mexico's interbank transfer system, run by Banxico) or Bre-B (Colombia's instant payment system, launched in 2025) payout, so the delivered amount the app shows is not trimmed by a Lumx fee on the way.
When transfer revenue is the wrong thing to build on
Three cases argue against building the business on transfers. The US neobank launch checklist shows where the payout leg sits in a 90-day plan.
Low volume. A fixed monthly platform cost and per-user checks need enough funded senders to cover them, and a markup that looks fine at 10,000 senders can lose money at a tenth of that.
A corridor with no local rail. A stablecoin payout is the wrong tool where the recipient's account type has no rail behind it, so check the coverage page before you design the screen.
Business senders. Large business payments are compared against SWIFT, not against a consumer app, and the stablecoins versus SWIFT comparison covers that case.
Lumx is also the wrong fit for a neobank whose senders mostly move money inside the United States.
Where the neobank's margin sits on a Lumx payout
Lumx is stablecoin payments infrastructure for businesses that move money between Latin America and the rest of the world: one API to collect, hold, convert, and pay out in BRL, MXN, COP, USD, EUR, and GBP or in USDC and USDT, over local rails such as PIX, SPEI, PSE, Bre-B, ACH, FEDWIRE, SEPA, and Faster Payments, with SWIFT and on-behalf-of payments and collections (POBO and COBO) in USD, EUR, and GBP, plus named virtual accounts, custodial wallets, and KYB/KYC built in.
Lumx is not a bank. The remittances guide describes the flow a neobank puts behind its send button. Each sender is an individual customer who accepts the terms of service and completes KYC (know your customer, the verification of an individual). A USD account lets the sender fund by ACH or wire, and a USD account takes up to one business day to activate. Lumx converts the deposit to stablecoin, the neobank registers the recipient as a destination under the sender, locks a rate and runs the payout. See stablecoin banking explained for the account model.
The margin is the partner fee. It is a rate in basis points, a flat dollar amount or both, set separately for deposits and payouts, and with a locked rate it is part of the quote. Collected fees go to a wallet address the neobank names, its own treasury wallet or one Lumx generates. A lock lasts 30 seconds, one minute or five minutes. The 30-second lock has no volatility fee, separate from your partner fee, and the longer ones include a fee for the rate risk. The lock has to outlast the confirmation screen, and the neobank decides whether the fee is a visible line or sits in the rate. Where it appears on a disclosure is a question for counsel. This post publishes no Lumx rates.
On the payout side, USDC to BRL over Pix and USDC to MXN over SPEI run 24/7/365 with instant settlement. Colombia pays out by Bre-B or ACH Colombia, chosen when the recipient is registered. USD funding by ACH takes one to two business days with a 2:00 PM ET cut-off, so a neobank that wants the sender's dollars in a wallet fast should set that expectation on the funding screen. A transfer held for an RFI (request for information, a compliance hold that asks for a document before a transaction clears) pauses until the document arrives. The USD funding leg is covered in USD to USDC, the corridor logic in the stablecoin corridor explainer, and the full rail list in global payments.
Methodology and sources
Chime's figures are from its Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2025, filed March 6, 2026 (SEC accession 0001795586-26-000013). Remitly's are from its Form 10-K for the same year, filed February 18, 2026 (accession 0001628280-26-009038). Both were read in full on sec.gov, which blocks the link checker, so they are cited by name and accession number. Revenue shares and per-dollar-sent figures are our arithmetic on those filings. Interchange rules are from 12 CFR 235.3, 235.4 and 235.5 on Cornell's Legal Information Institute, linked above, and the 2024 averages are from the Federal Reserve's Regulation II interchange table. All were read on November 1, 2026. The cost range comes from the CFPB's Remittance Rule Assessment Report (October 2018) and Consumer Financial Protection Circular 2024-02 (March 27, 2024), cited by name and date because consumerfinance.gov blocks the link checker. The report's figures predate 2025.
Lumx statements come from docs.lumx.io pages read on November 1, 2026: remittances, partner fees, exchange rates, coverage, accounts and cut-off times.
Verified on November 1, 2026. Operational context, not legal, tax, or investment advice.
Cover photo: Dmitry Tomashek on Unsplash.
How do neobanks make money on remittances?
They earn a transfer fee, a markup on the exchange rate, or both, and some also earn on the card and subscription revenue of the account the transfer sits in. Chime reports no remittance revenue, so the closest public proxy is Remitly, a remittance app, whose 10-K for 2025 describes its revenue as transaction fees plus foreign exchange spreads, which came to 2.18% of the $74.9 billion its customers sent. On Lumx, the neobank sets its margin as a partner fee, a rate in basis points, a flat amount or both, and the locked quote carries it.
What is an FX markup on a transfer?
It is the gap between the rate the customer is offered and the rate the neobank or its provider pays to buy the currency. It is not printed as a fee, so the only way to see it is to compare the amount the recipient gets with a reference rate. On Lumx, a locked quote returns a base and a final rate and a final target amount before the sender confirms, and the gap between them is fees, with no FX margin built in.
Do US neobanks earn interchange on remittances?
No. Interchange is paid by merchants on card purchases, so it comes from spending and not from transfers. A neobank earns it on the debit card tied to the account, and Regulation II caps it for issuers with $10 billion or more in assets. On Lumx, the transfer path is a local-currency deposit, a conversion and a payout, and the card revenue stays outside it.
Why do some apps advertise zero-fee transfers?
Because the fee can sit in the rate instead. Remitly's 10-K says promotions such as waived fees or better first-transfer rates are booked as reductions of revenue, so a free first transfer is an acquisition cost and not a missing revenue line. On Lumx, a neobank sets the deposit and payout fees separately, so it can leave one at zero.
What does a neobank typically charge to send money abroad?
The CFPB's 2018 assessment put a $200 transfer at roughly $8 to $18 depending on the destination, 4% to 9% of the amount by our arithmetic, from 2014 and 2017 data. Remitly's 2025 take was 2.18% of send volume, a company-wide average. On Lumx, the neobank sets the partner fee as basis points, a flat amount or both, and Lumx publishes no rates.
