Investors have just tipped another $20m into Alex Bank, a fast-growing Brisbane “neobank’’

Another $20m has just landed in the coffers of a fast-growing Brisbane “neobank’’ which only does business online.

Simon Beitz, co-founder and CEO of Alex Bank.

A fast-growing “neobank’’ headquartered in Brisbane has just pocketed a huge fill up for its financial war chest.

Investors tipped another $20m into the coffers of all-digital Alex Bank this month, adding to the $34m the start-up has already raised since launching in 2018.

The award-winning company, co-founded by ex-Suncorp players Simon Beitz (illustrated) and Craig Fenwick, is now valued at a whopping $120m but doesn’t expect profits before 2023.

Simon Beitz, co-founder and CEO of Alex Bank,

It secured a restricted banking license in July and, by next year, aims to win a full license allowing it to accept deposits.

Last month Alex started using new cloud-based software from Swiss firm Tenemos, which enables online loan applications to get filled out and processed in just minutes.

Clients can borrow between $2000 and $50,000 for periods between six months and five years.

More than $8m in personal loans have already been issued and Alex aims to boost that to $50m by the end of the year. Staff numbers are also expected to grow, doubling to around 70 over the next 12 months.

DAVID VS GOLIATH

It’s a David-versus-Goliath battle with a twist, where some of the key facts remain in dispute.

A 17-year-old student and environmental activist from Port Douglas is taking on banking colossus HSBC over what she alleges is misleading and deceptive ads suggesting the company supports saving the Barrier Reef.

Ava Shearer has just lodged a complaint with national advertising regulator Ad Standards over the bank’s promotion of its financial backing of “reef credits’’ aimed at slashing sediment and nutrient run-off from north Queensland farmers and graziers.

The online ads claim HSBC is “investing in the future of the reef’’ but Shearer, with the backing of anti-coal activists in the Stop Adani Campaign, maintains the bank is actually a big financier of coal and other dirty drivers of global warming.

Ava Shearer

A greenie-aligned research group claims the bank has tipped more than $110bn into fossil fuels over the past six years.

They also allege HSBC holds nearly $66m in bonds and another $4.3m in shares across the Adani Group of companies, including a stake in the coal port at Bowen.

Shearer, who is finishing year 12 in Cairns and works as a snorkel guide on the reef, accuses the company of “blatant greenwash’’ to bolster its public image.

“HSBC is doing more to prop up coal companies like Adani by investing in them than it is doing to help save the Great Barrier Reef. They need to be held accountable,’’ she said.

But a bank spin doctor hit back Monday, saying the company had no exposure to Adani’s Carmichael coal mine and would respond to the ad complaint.

“In 2014, we made it clear we will not finance the project, and this has not changed. We are not a direct investor in the Adani Group,’’ she told City Beat.

“Our policies prohibit the financing of new coal-fired power projects anywhere in the world.

“We have committed to phase out all coal financing in the OECD and EU by 2030 and globally by 2040.

“HSBC has also committed to aligning its provision of finance to net zero by 2050 or sooner, and to set short and medium term targets to achieve this.’’