Why we're building Arlenz
Personal finance apps have a trust problem. Here's how we're solving it.
There's a saying in the tech industry: "If you're not paying for the product, you are the product." Nowhere is this more evident than in personal finance apps.
The broken state of personal finance apps
Over the past decade, we've seen an explosion of "free" budgeting apps, spending trackers, and portfolio management tools. On the surface, they seem like a good deal — powerful features without any cost. But dig deeper, and you'll find a troubling business model.
These apps collect your most sensitive data: where you shop, how much you earn, what investments you hold, your net worth, your debt levels. Then they monetise it in ways that often work against your interests.
How "free" finance apps really make money
- →Data brokering: Selling aggregated (and sometimes individual) financial data to third parties — including advertisers, credit bureaus, and data brokers.
- →Affiliate referrals: Pushing credit cards, loans, and financial products that pay the highest commission — not the ones best suited for you.
- →Targeted advertising: Using your financial profile to serve hyper-targeted ads, often for high-interest credit products when you're most vulnerable.
- →Upselling premium services: Creating artificial limitations to push you toward paid tiers that still include the data monetisation.
The demise of Mint in late 2023 illustrated this perfectly. After 15 years, Intuit shut down the popular budgeting app, forcing millions of users to migrate to Credit Karma — a platform that generates revenue primarily through advertising financial products and earning referral commissions when users sign up for credit cards and loans. The incentives are clear: recommend products that pay the highest commissions, not those that best serve users.
Why users deserve better
Your financial data is among the most sensitive information you possess. It reveals your lifestyle, your habits, your aspirations, and your vulnerabilities. When this data is monetised, it's not just a privacy violation — it creates genuine harm:
- Credit card offers targeted at people in debt trap them in cycles of high-interest payments.
- Data breaches expose complete financial profiles to criminals.
- Algorithms that optimise for engagement keep users anxious rather than empowered.
- Recommendations that maximise referral fees rarely align with users' best interests.
We believe managing your finances shouldn't require surrendering your privacy. You deserve tools that work for you, not advertisers.
The Arlenz approach
We're building Arlenz on a simple principle: our business model must align with your interests. Here's what that means in practice:
Privacy-first architecture
Your data belongs to you. We don't sell it, share it with advertisers, or use it to push financial products. Our systems are designed from the ground up to collect only what's necessary and protect everything we do collect.
Transparent business model
We charge a subscription fee. That's how we make money. No hidden data sales, no affiliate commissions influencing our recommendations, no targeted advertising. When you pay us, we work for you.
Global accessibility
Most finance apps only work in a handful of countries where bank-aggregation services operate. Arlenz is designed to work everywhere — whether you have access to automatic bank connections or prefer to manage accounts manually.
Open architecture
We're building with openness in mind. Import and export your data freely. No lock-in, no proprietary formats designed to trap you. If you ever want to leave, you can take everything with you.
Beyond budgeting
We're also solving another problem: fragmentation. Today's landscape forces you to use one app for budgeting, another for investment tracking, perhaps a spreadsheet for net worth, and yet another for financial-goal planning.
Arlenz brings everything together. Track your spending, monitor your investments, visualise your complete financial picture, and plan for your future — all in one place. And because we can see the full picture, we can offer insights that siloed apps simply can't.
Helping you save money
Managing your finances isn't just about tracking — it's about taking action. That's why Arlenz actively helps you find ways to save:
- →Subscription detection: Arlenz automatically identifies recurring subscriptions in your transactions and alerts you to services you may have forgotten about or rarely use.
- →Redundancy spotting: Paying for multiple streaming services you barely watch? Have overlapping insurance policies? Arlenz spots redundant subscriptions and helps you cut the fat.
- →Expense insights: See where your money actually goes with intelligent categorisation, and identify areas where small changes could lead to significant savings.
The goal isn't to make you feel guilty about spending — it's to make sure every pound you spend is intentional, and to redirect the rest toward your financial goals.
Join us
We're just getting started, and we're building Arlenz for people who want to take control of their finances without giving up their privacy. If that resonates with you, we'd love to have you along for the journey.
Join our waitlist to be among the first to experience a personal finance platform that actually works in your interest.
