FDIC: Unbanked households at record low

Only 4.2% of U.S. households were unbanked in 2023, according to the FDIC’s latest biennial survey of Unbanked and Underbanked Households, the lowest national unbanked rate since the survey began in 2009.

More: The survey also found:

• Lower-income, less-educated, Black, Hispanic, disabled, and single-parent households continue to be significantly more likely to be unbanked.

• Two-thirds (66.2%) of unbanked households relied entirely on cash while a third (33.8%) of unbanked households relied upon a combination of prepaid cards or nonbank online payment services such as PayPal, Venmo or Cash App to conduct transactions.

• 14.2% of households were underbanked in 2023, meaning these households had a depository financial institution account yet primarily used nonbank products and services to meet their financial needs.

• In 2023, 4.8% of U.S. households owned or used crypto or digital assets, the majority (92.6%) as an investment and only 4.4% as a form of payment.

• Over the past decade, use of mobile banking as the primary means of account access increased almost ninefold, the use of bank tellers fell more than half, and the use of online banking declined more than one-third.

• 76.4% of households had a credit card in 2023 but 15.7% had no access to mainstream credit, down from 20.0% in 2017.

• 3.9% of all households reported using “buy now, pay later” short-term loans in the past 12 months.