Citizens has appointed payments veteran Matt Valente as senior vice president and head of strategy, innovation and partnerships, tasking him with advancing its corporate treasury and wholesale payments products. The move comes as banks and fintechs compete for corporate banking revenue, with Citizens looking to combine its broad banking capabilities with technology partnerships and new digital services.
Valente said banks and fintechs do not have to compete in every area. Banks can offer businesses a range of services—including accounts, payments, cards, ACH and lockbox services—within one relationship. They need to decide where to build in-house and where to work with partners, based on their capabilities and customer needs.
Citizens focuses on embedded finance
Valente described embedded finance as an important way for Citizens to reach customers. Embedded payments and finance integrate functions such as checkout, collections and other financial services into non-financial applications, allowing businesses to manage payments as part of their existing workflows.
Citizens has recently developed open banking APIs to support data sharing between customers and third parties. It has also introduced an account-switching feature in its mobile app to help customers move bill payments, subscriptions and direct deposits. The tools reflect the bank’s effort to expand how businesses and consumers use its services through data connectivity and account management.
Other banks are pursuing similar approaches. Huntington recently partnered with fintech Payabli to provide embedded payments, competing with business-focused platforms such as Ramp and Brex. Truist has teamed up with data technology company Plaid to expand its open banking strategy and add products and security controls.
Valente said embedded finance brings together banks’ account and funds infrastructure with fintechs’ product design and technology. For banks, the ability to offer a smoother payment experience without compromising security and control will affect their ability to win corporate customers.
Corporate digital-asset tests planned for 2027
When Valente joined Citizens, the bank was advancing technology initiatives in digital assets, artificial intelligence and international payments. It has spent the past year building related infrastructure and products, with new banking products for corporate customers planned for 2027. Cross-border payments and money transfers—particularly payment corridors serving emerging markets—are among the potential early use cases.
Citizens has also joined the Open USD stablecoin consortium, launched by Open Standard and comprising nearly 12 U.S. banks. The bank plans to test corporate digital-asset applications in 2027. Potential areas include cross-border payments, remittances to emerging markets, digital wallets and interoperability between decentralized ledgers and traditional corporate systems.
The initiatives form part of Citizens’ “Reimagine the Bank” transformation plan. The program includes deploying generative AI, AI agents and enterprise automation to reduce manual data collection, better align supplier contracts with business objectives, automate call-center processes and introduce advisory tools for customers and employees.
Citizens expects the program to generate $450 million in benefits by the end of 2028. About two-thirds is expected to come from cost savings, with the remainder from additional revenue. Raymond James analysts said the technology investments are improving the bank’s overall financial performance and are expected to support operating leverage and narrow its profitability gap with peers.
Banks trail fintechs in AI deployment
Before joining Citizens, Valente was senior vice president of corporate strategy at FIS, overseeing its banking, payments and capital markets businesses. He also held several management roles at JPMorganChase, covering API strategy, open banking, trade finance, payments modernization and commercial banking.
Valente said he has worked in both banking and fintech, where competition has long been part of the landscape. Banks, however, still face pressure to catch up in AI adoption. A McKinsey study of about 4,000 banks and fintech companies found that fintechs accounted for roughly 40% of recently launched financial-services AI projects in the sample, but 70% of AI projects overall.
McKinsey said traditional banks have advantages in scale and data but lag fintechs in deploying AI projects that deliver measurable business results. For Citizens, the test will be whether its open banking, embedded payments, AI and digital-asset initiatives translate into corporate revenue and sustained cost savings.