MagNet Bank
Hungarian community bank rooted in a 1995 savings cooperative, operating under the MagNet name since 2010 and fully Hungarian-owned. It ties everyday banking to social benefit: depositors choose which loan communities their savings finance, customers direct a tenth of the bank's profit to civil-society causes each year through its community donation program, and account fees can be set by the customer on a pay-what-you-feel basis. The only Hungarian member of the Global Alliance for Banking on Values, MagNet is preparing one of the first retail-bank deployments of GNU Taler, the privacy-preserving digital payment system, as a partner in the EU-funded NGI TALER consortium.
MagNet Bank is values-based banking inside the fiat system: depositor-directed lending, customer-steered profit donations and self-set fees, as Hungary's only Global Alliance for Banking on Values member. It scores at the floor on monetary design — it is a forint bank, not a currency — but earns its place on the map as the banking partner bringing GNU Taler's privacy-preserving digital cash to retail accounts, a live bridge between ethical banking and fair-money infrastructure.
M69 Score
Scored against the Money2069 Manifesto — see methodology. Higher = more aligned.
Detailed Rating Breakdown
Issuance Model3x1.0
A licensed commercial bank: money creation is credit issuance in forint under central-bank rules — debt-based, discretionary within regulation, with no independent or real-economy-indexed issuance of its own (IM-01/02 at floor).
Spending Power Stability2x1.0
No currency or stability mechanism of its own; customers hold forint deposits whose spending power tracks HUF inflation entirely (SPS-01/02 at floor).
Fiat Independence & Interoperability2x1.0
The institution is fiat banking infrastructure: HUF unit of account, central-bank settlement, full dependence on the national payment system. Its GNU Taler work adds a privacy-preserving digital-cash layer on top of fiat rather than an exit from it (FI-01/02/03 at floor).
Traction2x3.0
Three decades of continuous operation, a five-figure client base including 390+ banked NGOs, community branches run as civic spaces, and institutional recognition — only Hungarian member of the Global Alliance for Banking on Values, partner in the 11-member EU NGI TALER consortium. Organic and durable, but confined to one national market and denominated in fiat (TR-05 low).
Sovereignty1.0
A single regulated joint-stock bank under Hungarian jurisdiction, fully custodial by nature; the state licenses and can halt it — the antithesis of state-free money (SO-01/03/04 at floor).
Governance2.0
Privately owned Zrt, not member-governed, but unusually participatory for its class: depositors steer loan allocation via community deposits and customers direct the donation program. Documented and transparent, yet ultimately management-controlled with no formal member vote (GO-01 ~2, GO-02 low).
Resilience4.0
Profitable, deposit-insured, self-funding institution operating since 1995; absorbed Sopron Bank in 2021 and has grown through multiple macro cycles. Funding sustainability (RE-07) is its strongest suit; recovery and redundancy are those of a regulated bank.
Inclusivity3.0
Retail banking open to any Hungarian resident, pay-what-you-like account fees (0–1,000 HUF), explicit civil-society focus and 390+ NGO clients; but standard bank KYC (IN-06 ~2) and single-country reach bound its inclusiveness.