In 2020, Paul Judge and Ryan Glover, both seasoned Black entrepreneurs, started work on a plan to help solve one of America’s most intractable social problems: the yawning wealth gap between White households and Black and Latino families. After facing decades of discrimination by banks, Black and Latino customers need a safe, welcoming place to put their money, they argued, as they developed a plan for launching Greenwood, a banking platform rather than a traditional bank.
Launched amid the racial justice protests that followed the police killing of George Floyd in 2020, Greenwood quickly drew support from prominent Black celebrities, including music producer Jermaine Dupri, and banking giants such as Wells Fargo and JPMorgan Chase. Glover and Judge boasted that 700,000 potential customers had signed up for Greenwood’s wait list before it even launched product