This is one of those instances where different people see different things in the same statement.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/monzo-lends-customers-money-to-buy-its-shares-375nmdc6r
Monzo state in the prospectus for raising £20m, that customers need to have enough money in their accounts to purchase shares. This 'enough' can include their OD if they have one, it goes on to say. Of course we all know that these shares in Monzo are illiquid for now and may always illiquid.
What is does not say is that Monzo recommend or even suggest that customers use their Monzo OD to purchase shares in Monzo. That much is very clear. At this stage of the process only Monzo customers can purchase these shares - it has not been opened up to the public yet. This is all part of the requirement for Monzo to offer existing SHs first bite. And Monzo state that customers must use their Monzo accounts to buy these shares - a solid way of increasing usage. It seems this may all have been misread.
This wording doesn't reflect well on Monzo but the article doesn't reflect well on The Times. Monzo could have been more careful to separate the sentence about buying shares and the one about the OD.
If the prospectus was promoting an offer of a Monzo overdraft to buy illiquid shares in Monzo, then the Times piece would be legitimate. But Im really struggling to make that case by reading what Monzo have actually written.
What would have made and might well make a better article is to ask just how Monzo go about judging if applicants should be given a £1000 OD. We are told that it's really pretty easy to get one and that the 'checking' is largely self assessment. Now that is something to worry about.
