Mint

Market position

Described in 2008 as the largest and fastest-growing personal financial management application on the web and later characterized as a one-time gold standard in consumer financial data aggregation, positioned as an online challenger to Intuit's Quicken. After acquisition it declined from a reported peak of roughly 20 million users to about 3.6 million, with observers describing it as neglected and in maintenance mode within Intuit.

Mint was free at a time when most personal finance software required upfront payment or complex setup, required no manual data import or synchronization, offered anonymous email-only registration, automated categorization of transactions, anonymous peer spending comparison, and proactive alerts and personalized savings recommendations.

Technology

Mint aggregated account data from users' financial institutions, initially via a deal with Yodlee and later, after the Intuit acquisition, through Intuit's own account-connection system. Historically the service relied on screen scraping using consumer-supplied login credentials. It downloaded transaction data daily and applied patent-pending technology and proprietary algorithms to compile, categorize and unify account activity, plus an alerting engine for low balances, fees, upcoming bills and suspicious activity. The original alpha was built in Java J2EE and MySQL. In 2010 the service reported connectivity to more than 16,000 US and Canadian financial institutions and support for more than 17 million individual financial accounts.

Go-to-market

Free, self-serve consumer web product with sign-up in under five minutes using only an email address, launched via a public beta and a high-profile debut at the TechCrunch40 conference in September 2007 (first prize, $50,000). Growth was driven by word of mouth and press coverage, with mobile apps added over time; after the Intuit acquisition it was distributed within Intuit's consumer portfolio.

US and Canadian retail consumers using online banking who wanted a free, aggregated view of their spending, budgets and net worth; the service was noted as popular with mass-affluent users and referenced by some RIA clients as a benchmark for reporting clarity.

Geography

Headquartered in Mountain View, California (also described as Menlo Park, California in one 2023 account); incorporated in Canada per Wikipedia. The service served users in the United States and Canada.

History

Founded in 2006 by Aaron Patzer, Mint raised a Series A in April 2007 with participation from Shasta Ventures and First Round Capital, launched its public beta in September 2007 at TechCrunch40, and raised a $12 million Series B led by Benchmark Capital in March 2008. It raised more than $31 million in total venture funding from investors including DAG Ventures, Shasta Ventures, First Round Capital and angel investor Ram Shriram, closing a final $14 million round on August 4, 2009 that Patzer described as preemptive; TechCrunch later pegged its 2009 valuation at $140 million. Intuit agreed to acquire Mint for $170 million in September 2009 and completed the deal on November 2, 2009, with Patzer becoming vice president and general manager of Intuit's personal finance group before leaving in December 2012. Under Intuit the product replaced Online Quicken, absorbed the Mint Bills bill-payment service (from the acquired Check, Inc.) in 2017, and was shut down on March 23, 2024 with users pointed to Credit Karma.

Risks & controversies

In 2010 it was reported that Mint asked users for both usernames and passwords to their financial accounts and stored them in a decryptable format, raising concerns that a database breach would expose those credentials. A longstanding data-access dispute with JPMorgan Chase was settled in January 2017, with Intuit agreeing to develop software allowing Chase customers to share data without Intuit storing names and passwords, and never to sell Chase customer data. Mint's dependence on screen-scraped data became a structural risk: Fidelity blocked screen scrapers effective October 1, 2023, referring them to the Akoya data feed, and the CFPB was preparing a rule to end screen scraping. Patzer was also criticized in startup circles for selling the company for too little.