The Four Migrations of Financial Power
Over the past twenty years, banking functions have undergone four distinct power shifts. The first migration moved power from traditional bank charters to user-facing neobanks (e.g., Chime, Monzo), which captured customers via mobile interfaces. The second shift transferred power to payment and clearing networks such as Visa and Wise, bypassing banks' monopoly over payment rails. The third migration introduced stablecoin-driven global digital dollar systems—USDT and USDC—enabling value transfer outside the SWIFT network. The fourth and ongoing migration places control directly in users' hands through self-custodial on-chain accounts (MetaMask, Gnosis Pay), returning financial sovereignty from institutions to individuals.
The central argument is that banking's core functions—accounts, payments, clearing, and savings—are being systematically unbundled and re-homed in non-bank entities and protocol layers. Neobanks represent only the first step; stablecoins and self-custodial wallets are the ultimate destination.