Enact fundamental change..

Roughly two billion people in the world today are ‘unbanked’. And the challenge is far beyond an adminstrative issue. People who do not hold an account with a legacy financial institution often cannot access a host of services many of us take for granted.

Those who are unbanked tend to be among the poorest members of society. Deemed risky prospects by their local financial institutions, this lack of access contributes to locking this segment of humans in a cycle of poverty.

And it’s a a global phenomenon, effecting all types of economies: 28% of Saudi Arabians are unbanked, 37% of Ukrainians are unbanked, as well as 60% of Nigerians (a potential domestic market of some 125 million people!).

Over the years, several ‘slum bank’ projects have been implemented to address this situation, with the majority running into institutional barriers and ultimately folding.

Because competition is only good for business if you’re willing to be competitive. But if you already rule the roost? Well, then the playbook is completely different.

Plus the number of those who are unbanked is just so big that, at best, it will take decades for this demographic to be served by the traditional financial system.

But, in truth, they may have already missed their opportunity.

Extras:Logo.

Touchwords:Compassionate. Constructive. Courageous.

Why crypto will bank the poor

The most impressive, and fundamentally significant aspect of the growth of the crypto ecosystem in recent years is not that it has grown up, but that it has grown out. Increasing access to crypto services in the developing world has seen significant dents made in that headline figure of 2 billion unbanked.

Because while some complain about overcooked networks or the inability to scale, when your alternatives are paltry, the outlook will be completely different.

And not just in lack of physical access to traditional banking services. We’re talking super strict daily limits on withdrawal, routinely frozen accounts, bans on conversion out of the local currency to escape hyperinflation that makes the US dollar look like a premium .COM domain.

Acording to the numbers, large swaths of the ‘unbanked’ demographic are simply skipping ahead to crypto.

Why? Because it is just more practical.

Can’t get an appointment to even discuss setting up a bank account? (That will remotely store your funds amid interest rates that guarantee your principal is eroded by inflation.)

Well, how about you buy a third-hand phone for 15 bucks?

Now tap a few screens and throw a nice DeFi banking app on there. They don’t know and don’t care who or where you are. If the color of your crypto is orange, you may just be in business.

Not much online access where you live? Digital money can be sent by text, with pioneering development agencies using it to provide direct cash assistance to communities in many parts of the developing world. Word on the street is even BTC can be sent without internet or a smartphone.

Slow as ever, legacy finance is now finally seeing that the gauntlet on this has been thrown down. What they have yet to realize is that the window for response has already passed. As of the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, they served their notice!

Styling the Slum Bank brand

As a brand proposition, the imagery and associations of SlumBank.com is set up for a financially liberating endeavor.

It says exactly what it does, needs to say, and should say. No more, no less.
Or, as Einstein (is said to have) put it:
“Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler.”

Morover, it manages to strike a even blend of reality and strength. Choosing to neither veer down a blind alley of overly political correctness nor romanticize the tough, crowded and alive conditions within which many human lives. This is the slum, and here is its bank. Owned of the slum, serving those who find themselves here.

Set in that classic two four-letter words construction, SlumBank is also a brand whose semantic flow is beautifully balanced and its presentation visually appealing. This embedded balance also means that it can be stylized equally as effectively as two separate words or as run together using camel case.

This styling preference will depend on your specific brand ethos. The word ‘slum’ is already so striking, and this impact is heightened even further by juxtaposing it with the clean and unequivocable ‘bank’.

With the charge of the brand fueled by the viewer potentially (subconsciously) holding these two words as being antithetical to one another. The former sprawling and squishy, messy and informal; the latter delimited and hard, tidy and do-you-up-your-tie formal.

Yet, here they are, being presented for what, at the end of the day, all they really are: Two four-letter English noun/verbs. Indiacted as a balanced duo and with each word being equatable to the other.

Form supports content & content supports form

So, building on this striking impact through an attuned choice of casing, the owner of this domain can basically choose which nuance they would prefer.

If you run with two words, we would argue that you are ‘formalizing’ the equatability of a/the slum bank with any other bank, highclass or lowclass.
We are a bank. We do the bank thing. For the slum.

While running the words together would mean you are highlighting further the unorthodox position you’re taking up, and acknowledging it is so. You are fresh and cutting edge and act like you are fully aware of the intangible borders you are crossing.

Put in visuals, casting your offering as SlumBank is meeting with Cyril, the manager of that posh London bank, sporting a sick Crypto Punk hairdo, knowing how people will judge you, and sending off self-conscious signals, daring them to do so.

While Slum Bank is attending the same meeting dressed in a full Bored Ape outfit, but making zero reference to it or giving any indication that it could be deemed as out of place. That non-plussed expression on your face not budging an inch as Cyril fumbles his papers and stutters through his pitch.