Brex announces $5.6B commercial card partnership with Fifth Third Bank powered by AI financial workflows
Dec 9, 2025 with Pedro Franceschi
Key Points
- Brex partners with Fifth Third Bank on a $5.6 billion commercial card deal, gaining distribution to roughly 8% of US businesses while maintaining Brex branding and controlling the card product.
- Brex's owned infrastructure on Mastercard rails since 2018 lets it add bank partners or expand geographies rapidly, now operating card issuance in over 200 countries.
- Brex's enterprise client base has grown to 250 public companies from roughly 5 to 10 three to four years ago, driven by AI-powered financial workflows and automated compliance handling.
Summary
Brex has announced a $5.6 billion commercial card partnership with Fifth Third Bank, giving the fintech access to a distribution network that covers roughly 8% of US businesses. The deal is Brex-branded, not white-labeled under Fifth Third, with Fifth Third retaining ownership of the banking and lending relationships while Brex handles the card product, software, and AI-driven financial workflows.
The partnership is built on infrastructure Brex has owned outright since 2018, when the company bypassed third-party issuance platforms like Stripe Issuing or Marqeta and built directly on Mastercard's rails. That vertical integration now lets Brex add new bank partners or expand into new geographies by effectively flipping a switch, and the company says it operates in over 200 countries with local card issuance in each market.
Pedro Franceschi, Brex CEO and co-founder, argues that the strategic rationale is straightforward: 98% of US businesses are still running on legacy corporate cards, and the combination of Fifth Third's branch network and customer relationships with Brex's software and AI automation creates compounding value for commercial customers. He points to earlier embedded partnerships with Navan and Zip as proof of demand for this model.
On stablecoins, Brex has added support for stablecoin card payments on its banking product, but Franceschi is measured about blockchain's utility in Brex's core global business. The friction point is the fiat on-ramp and off-ramp layer, where an employee reimbursing in Indian rupees or Brazilian reais still requires local currency settlement. Brex's global product is deliberately designed to keep transactions in local currency to minimize FX costs, which stablecoins do not meaningfully solve.
The enterprise push is gaining traction. Brex has grown from roughly 5 to 10 public company clients three to four years ago to 250 today. International expansion has exposed the complexity of compliance requirements, including country-specific per diem rules that vary depending on an employee's home country versus travel destination, which Brex addresses through automated card data processing.