“Can PC Financial's loyalty-linked banking platform — built on modernized core banking infrastructure — become the foundation for EQB's scaled challenger bank serving millions of Canadians through the PC Optimum ecosystem?”
PC Financial was founded as the in-house financial services arm of Loblaw Companies (Canada's largest grocer), offering no-fee credit cards and banking products tightly integrated with the PC Optimum loyalty program. Over time it evolved from a private-label credit card program into a full Schedule I chartered bank (President's Choice Bank) offering deposit accounts. In 2024 it modernized its core infrastructure by adopting Temenos SaaS on Azure, signaling ambition to expand its banking proposition beyond loyalty-linked products. In 2025 Loblaw agreed to sell PC Financial to EQB Inc., Canada's challenger bank, which will use the PC Optimum partnership and PC Financial's ~3.5 million customer base as the foundation for a scaled loyalty-linked challenger banking ecosystem.