Mint Gets Eaten by the Borg

Intuit (INTU) is buying Mint.com for a whopping $170 million. That’s a lot of money for a company which has yet to make a dollar in profit — indeed, it found itself in need of an extra $14 million in equity capital only last month.

So what makes Mint worth so much? The website basically has two main possible revenue sources. The first is the way it’s making money right now (or getting revenues, anyway): armed with its users’ financial information, it can act as a broker, introducing them to offers from financial-services companies which might be a good deal. And like any broker, it gets to keep a commission.

There’s also what Mike Arrington calls “a goldmine of user data” — incredibly granular information on the saving, spending and borrowing habits of 1.4 million registered users who between them account for $175 billion in transactions, and $47 billion in assets. If that information is added to the information which Intuit already holds, it could provide unprecedented insight into how Americans deal with money.

The problem is that while Mint is generally much-loved, Intuit is generally much-hated. Mint is free; Intuit is constantly trying to squeeze every marginal dollar out of its customers. Mint’s user experience is a joy; Intuit’s is gruesomely bad. (And is possibly responsible for the whole nightmare that was Tim Geithner’s tax situation.) Mint is trusted; Intuit isn’t.

The fear is that Intuit will stop showing Mint’s customers the offers which are best for them, and will start showing Mint’s customers the offers that are best for Intuit, even if those offers are predatory or otherwise unsuitable. And as for the money which Intuit might squeeze out of those users’ personal financial data — again, while I trusted Mint not to do anything evil, I don’t have the same feelings about Intuit.

I do have a Mint account, but I don’t use it very much, and it’s a bit glitchy. I think I’ll probably deactivate it now. Better safe than sorry.

Comments

[jack dee:]

This reads like a miffed Mint user venting / Intuit hater with a keyboard




THis is just a plain old fashioned SMEAR.
"generally much-hated."
"squeeze every marginal dollar out of its customers"
"gruesomely bad"
"predatory "
"the Borg"
"{squeeze out of those users’ personal financial data "
"Mint is trusted; Intuit isn’t"




And yet millions of people choose to buy TurboTax year after year after year.

Sep 14 02:58 PM

[kmayger:]

Intuit is hated by whom? I could say the sky is green. But I'd sound as silly as this guy if 1) The sky isn't green and 2) I had no data to back it up. You'll go far with someone like NBC or CBS. But like them, unless you tell the truth, you'll end up talking to yourself.

Sep 15 12:45 PM

[Phillip Jain:]

We sympathize with Mint - after a certain stage data trust is something people will rely on their banks for, like it or not.
Author says he doesn't trust Intuit. I disagree. Mint (and its users) could benefit greatly from the greater trust people are likely place in a billion dollar 20+year old company like Intuit rather than yet another Web2.0 startup.

Personally, I stopped using TurboTax long before Geithner because I found it buggy and too heavy. Its DRM (from another company's software) basically screwed up my computer many years ago & I never tried it again. I am sure Intuit probably fixed its cash cow by now.

Other older companies in this space (Yodlee) and even Microsoft are still struggling with the trust issue and seem to target other ways than personal finance. Intuit is one of the few non-bank independents that is still struggling away. I think it will benefit even though it may lose money by a "free" model.

In our own experience (buyandmonitor.com) the ability to provide risk management and due diligence to investors is hampered by the fragmented data scattered between brokers & banks. So even though we are not at all transactional, we have to struggle to work over this "data" trust issue.

Sep 15 05:09 PM