Virgin Direct
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| Private (Limited liability) | |
| Founded | 3 March 1995 |
| Founder | Richard Branson |
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Area served
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United Kingdom Australia South Africa |
| Services |
Finance Banking Mortgages |
| Owner | Virgin Group and others |
| Website | www |
Virgin Money is a financial services brand used by three independent brand-licensees worldwide. Virgin Money branded services are currently available in Australia, South Africa and the United Kingdom. Virgin Money branded services were formerly offered in the United States.
Each Virgin Money branded entity acts independently from the others, thus the products vary from country to country.
Virgin Money currently has operations in Australia with 150,000 customers.
Virgin Money currently has operations in South Africa. In 2006, Virgin Money South Africa launched with a credit card initially in a partnership with ABSA worth $33 million.
Virgin Money currently has operations in the United Kingdom with 4 million customers. The company was initially established as a personal finance company under the name of Virgin Direct in 1995, and the Virgin Money brand itself was introduced in 2000. Virgin Money rapidly expanded as a bank in 2012 with the purchase of the nationalised bank Northern Rock.
In 2007, Virgin Money launched in the USA after the Virgin Group made a majority stake investment in CircleLending, a company that facilitated peer-to-peer loans. Virgin Money USA entered into dissolution on 1 November 2010, and is no longer listed as a Virgin property on the Virgin Money home page; the Virgin Money US site itself was also dismantled. Virgin Money subsequently withdrew entirely from the US market and its social lending servicing was transferred to its servicing partner, Graystone Solutions, which continues to service the social loans under its own brand.
Virgin Money's logo is focused around the main logo of Virgin Group, which is an underlined word 'Virgin' in a red and magenta gradient coloured circle. This logo was introduced in January 2012 to signify the purchase of Northern Rock, which used a magenta logo.
Virgin Money's older logo was the word 'Virgin' in a red rounded skew rectangle, similar in shape to a credit card, followed by the word 'Money'. This logo remains in use in South Africa. The previous logo had used a red logo with the word 'Virgin' in a large circle and three smaller circles above the word 'Money'. Virgin Direct's logo had been a more simplistic rendering of the company name, in white on top of a red rectangle with a semicircle attached on the left side.
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Wikipedia