Dive Brief:

• Fintech startup Stripe is partnering with Goldman Sachs, Citi, Barclays and Evolve Bank & Trust to offer bank accounts to the merchants and vendors that use Stripe's platform, the online payment processor announced Thursday.

• The new offering, called Stripe Treasury, will allow Stripe's clients to receive Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC)-insured debit cards and bank accounts through the new banking partnerships. 

• Stripe said Canadian e-commerce company Shopify is among the first Stripe clients that will begin offering the accounts early next year through Shopify Balance.

Dive Insight:

With Stripe Treasury, which is invite-only at the moment, the company is diving deeper into the online business finance space.

Stripe entered the business lending space last year with the launch of Stripe Capital, which offers $10,000 to $20,000 loans to online businesses that are already customers with the company, and to merchants that sell on platforms such as Shopify.

Hari Moorthy, Goldman Sachs's global head of transaction banking, said the partnership with Stripe will help relieve the frustrations internet businesses encounter when it comes to banking.

"The millions of ambitious, fast-growing businesses in the Stripe ecosystem will soon discover a dramatically improved end-to-end digital banking experience," Moorthy said in a statement.

Like the 11 banks and credit unions partnering with tech giant Google to offer the yet-to-be-launched Google Plex accounts, Stripe's latest venture further demonstrates how traditional financial institutions are increasingly turning to fintech partnerships as a way to grow customers. 

"This is an effective way of acquiring more customers through Stripe's channel," Moorthy told American Banker. "And it's an elegant way for Stripe to integrate additional banking services with the end merchant."

Moorthy said the account opening process is automated and the bank expects a large number of accounts will be opened in minutes.