# Benchmarking active users, engagement and retention
Chime's 2025 IPO prospectus disclosed roughly 8.6 million active members against a much larger pool of registered accounts built up over a decade of growth marketinggrowth marketingAn experimental, data-driven approach to rapid growth by identifying and scaling the most efficient acquisition levers.Voir la définition complète →. That gap between "signed up" and "actually shows up" is the single most important number a fintech analyst checks before believing a growth story. Revolut, still private but disclosing selective metrics to press and investors, has cited "over 50 million customers" globally while separately reporting monthly active users (MAU) in the 20 million range in some periods. Divide the two and you get a ratio far below what a healthy US neobank should show. This lesson teaches you how to compute that ratio, what it should look like, and how to spot when a company is presenting registered users as if they were engaged ones.
MAU (monthly active user) is a user who logged in, transacted, or otherwise engaged with the app in the trailing 30 days. Registered users is anyone who ever created an account, including people who downloaded the app once, funded $5, and never returned.
The ratio that matters:
MAU-to-registered ratio = MAU ÷ cumulative registered usersBenchmark for US neobanks (2024-2025, estimate): 20-30% is considered healthy. Chime's own S-1 filing (2025) implied a ratio in that range when using active members against total accounts opened, per its SEC EDGAR filing. European challengers like Revolut and N26 have historically disclosed ratios that analysts estimate nearer 35-45% of registered customers, though Revolut's own reporting mixes "customers" (a lifetime cumulative figure) with MAU in ways that make apples-to-apples comparison hard, a pattern worth flagging on its own.
Say a neobank reports:
Step 1: Compute the ratio.
2,400,000 ÷ 12,000,000 = 0.20 = 20%Step 2: Compare to the 20-30% US benchmark (estimate). This sits at the low end but within range, not automatically alarming.
Step 3: Now compare to a peer reporting 50 million lifetime customers and 20 million MAU:
20,000,000 ÷ 50,000,000 = 0.40 = 40%On the surface, peer two looks stickier. But check the denominator's definition. If "customers" for peer two includes anyone who ever opened a free multi-currency card while traveling once, and "registered users" for peer one includes only people who completed full KYC (Know Your Customer, the identity verification required under Anti-Money Laundering rules), the ratios are not measuring the same thing. Always check the footnote defining the denominator before trusting the ratio.
Analysts triangulate several figures together rather than relying on one:
1. MAU / DAU (daily active users) ratio
A stickiness measure borrowed from consumer tech. DAU ÷ MAU above 20% is considered strong engagement for a financial app (payment apps used daily, like a debit card substitute, should land here). Below 10% suggests the app is used occasionally, more like insurance than a primary spending tool.
2. Primary banking relationship (PBR) rate
The share of active users who direct deposit their paycheck into the account, the single strongest predictor of retention in US neobanking. Chime has disclosed PBR rates around 60% or higher (estimate, per company disclosures) among its active member base, a figure regulators and investors treat as a proxy for "this is their real bank, not a side wallet."
3. Cohort retention curves
Percentage of a signup cohort still active at month 1, 3, 6, 12. A fintech with 90% month-1 retention but 15% month-12 retention has an acquisition engine, not a retention engine, a classic sign of promo-driven signups (sign-up bonuses, referral cash) that churn once the incentive ends.
4. Revenue per active user (ARPU or ARPAU)
ARPU = Total revenue ÷ average MAU (over the period)US neobanks: estimate of $30-80 per active user annually, varying heavily by interchange revenue and subscription tiers. European players monetizing through FX and subscription fees (Revolut's premium tiers, for instance) sometimes report higher ARPU estimates, partly because multi-currency and trading features up-sell more aggressively than a pure US checking-replacement product.
When a fintech reports growth, ask three questions in order:
1. What exactly is being counted? Registered, verified (KYC-passed), or active? These are different populations, and companies sometimes switch definitions between reporting periods without flagging it.
2. What is the time window? MAU over 28 days versus 30 versus a full calendar month changes the number by a few percent, enough to matter in comparisons.
3. Is the ratio moving with the base, or against it? A ratio holding steady while the registered base doubles is more impressive than a ratio holding steady on a flat base, because it means new cohorts are activating at the same rate as old ones, no engagement decay.
For a primer on how public fintechs are required to disclose these metrics under US securities law, see the SEC's guidance on key performance metrics disclosure (2020 interpretive release), which specifically calls out MAU and similar figures as needing consistent definitions across reporting periods.
Vérification des acquis
1. Why do fintech companies tend to favor 'registered users' over MAU in marketing materials?
2. A neobank reports 10 million registered users and 1 million MAU. Based on the benchmark discussed, how should an analyst interpret this?
3. Why does comparing Revolut's 'over 50 million customers' figure directly to its MAU create an analytical problem?
4. Select ALL correct answers about what qualifies a user as a 'monthly active user (MAU)' as defined in this lesson.
Sélectionnez toutes les réponses correctes.
5. Select ALL correct answers about why the MAU-to-registered ratio is a useful analytical tool for fintech analysts.
Sélectionnez toutes les réponses correctes.
Europe's PSD2 (Payment Services Directive 2, the EU regulation enabling open bankingopen bankingCadre réglementaire (PSD2 en Europe) obligeant les banques à partager les données clients via des API standardisées, avec consentement, transformant les données bancaires en actif compétitif. and account aggregation) means European neobank users often hold three or four fintech apps simultaneously, splitting activity across providers. This structurally lowers any single app's MAU-to-registered ratio compared to the US, where switching a primary bank account is friction-heavy and users tend to consolidate.
US neobanks compete harder for PBR because interchange revenue (the fee merchants pay on debit card transactions, regulated for large banks under the Durbin Amendment but not for smaller issuers, which is part of why neobanks partner with smaller sponsor banks) depends on transaction volume from a primary account. This is why Chime's disclosures emphasize PBR and direct deposit metrics so heavily: it's the leading indicator regulators, investors and the company itself watch most closely.
🎬 [VIDEO: "How Neobanks Actually Make Money" - youtube.com/results?search_query=how+neobanks+make+money+interchange - search for recent explainer content covering interchange, subscription, and lending revenue models at Chime, Revolut, and N26]
| Signal | Healthy | Warning sign |
|---|---|---|
| MAU/registered | 20-30%+ (US, estimate) | Below 15%, or undisclosed |
| DAU/MAU | Above 15-20% | Below 10% |
| Month-12 cohort retention | Above 30-40% (estimate, varies by product) | Below 15% |
| PBR rate trend | Flat or rising | Declining quarter over quarter |
None of these thresholds are regulatory requirements, they are analyst heuristics built from cross-company observation, so treat them as estimates to sanity-check disclosures, not hard rules.