Innovation. Nations. Kingdom.
INK Investments invests in a series of fintech companies that encompasses the Kingdom Bank Plan and its step-by-step implementation. Its aim is to create prospering local economies and thriving local communities again!
Innovation
It is He that gives you power (innovation) to produce wealth. Deu 8:18
Kingdom Bank is not built on the current fractional reserve banking system. It invests in full reserve banking and in innovation to create and steward wealth.
Nations
And you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow. Deu 15:6
It is a banking reform plan using a people’s bank model implemented one community at a time. Kingdom Bank is also a banker’s bank as a lender to the nations.
Kingdom
For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Matt 6:13
Kingdom Bank makes a lasting impact by nourishing healthy communities and a working model for national and regional governments to develop thriving local economies.
Built With a Team of Bankers, Economists, IT & Community Specialists
Using a multidisciplinary approach to banking, we combine the essential banking services, self-sustainable community economics, and kingdom economic principles by harnessing the power of fintech (an emerging industry that uses innovation and technology to improve activities in finance and competes with traditional financial methods). The economy, banking and currency are integrated to function in harmony in a distributed network of kingdom banking communities. We also recognize the power of offering financial services to those living in Opportunity Zones to frontier markets.
Multidisciplinary Approach
Unlike the traditional banking approach, Kingdom Banking adopts a fresh look from a multidisciplinary approach bringing in community economics, banking services and information technology in a manner that will grow healthy communities. Banking is becoming a confluence of several disparate disciplines such as finance and risk management, IT and Communication Technologies to help service customers with efficient margins and convenience.
Self-sustainable Communities
Kingdom Banking adopts a bottom-up approach of banking looking from a community level of economics and up. Most governments and NGOs provide reforms that are top-down in approach. They are mostly implemented from a national level and downstream. Strong and healthy communities are built by transformed individuals starting from family level and up to community level. Not the other way around. Values bring purposeful people together to innovate within a biblical-oriented collaborative economy.
Banking as a Service
As information and communication technologies advanced banking became more convenient and efficient. Banking is no longer somewhere you go rather something you just do. Banking is a unique connection between customers and their money, on a real-time basis, being able to service customers and their financial needs as they arise, contextually. Functions of money and banking needs a fresh look to bring services to benefit healthy communities.
Kingdom Principles
The success of a thriving community and economic prosperity lies in the purpose. The purpose of any enterprising is to be aligned to biblical meaning of human life and sustenance. The 5 P’s that brings success starts with Promise first, then People, Productivity, Planet and lastly Profit. The Hebrew word Khayil is used for wealth in Deu 8:18. Khayil means all these-people, productivity and profit (money). The scope of profit is defined as the cost of sustenance rather than mere wealth accumulation. Kingdom Bank Plan is simply a modern version of using current banking and currency technologies in a free market society.
Parallel Economy
Kingdom Bank can run parallel with the current monetary and banking system. It is not an existential threat to the current financial system. It enhances the national economy by reviving local economies and creating strong local communities. Joseph built the food supply chain and infrastructure before the famine in Egypt. It worked parallel to the existing economic structure of Egypt. Kingdom Banking is on an inevitable collision to transform the old money machine into a prosperity platform for strategic times ahead. The early church had self-sustainable economic management as the existing surplus resources were distributed within the community.
Purposeful Ventures
Capital comes from the Latin word ‘caput’ which means head. “And you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principalities and powers” (Col 2:10). Christ is the head. Therefore stewarding capital needs a Christ focus. Kingdom Bank as a lender is responsible for stewardship and productive use of capital. Wealth accumulation is seen as a means to sustain purposeful ventures. In the 5 P’s Purpose(promise) comes before Profits. Purposeful Ventures hold a holistic approach for healthy growth of individuals and communities alongside healthy profits.
Transition from The Current Monetary & Banking System
Out of the total 7.6 billion people today, a whopping 7 billion people still live to meet sustenance on a day to day basis. Despite all the technological and financial advancements of today, something is drastically wrong with the “economic prosperity” picture today. Governments and international monetary organizations such as the World Bank & IMF have tried different policiesfor decades experimenting with economic solutions. Yet the problem remains the same.
fractional reserve banking
Fractional Reserve banking is one way governmental bodies accumulate debt by facilitating the market cycles and makes credit easy. Banks hold minimum reserves of cash or highly liquid assets equal to a fixed percentage of their deposit liabilities. The minimum percentage of reserves may be adopted voluntarily as a matter of commercial prudence, or required by law or convention in the case of fractional banking. The monetary authorities can increase the ratio of reserves to deposits that indicates a tighter credit policy. Monetary policy is at best a blunt instrument, while monetarism has the opposite effect.
full reserve banking
The alternative to fractional-reserve banking is full-reserve banking where deposits are ready for immediate withdrawal on demand. Or funds deposited by customers in demand deposit accounts are not loaned by the bank to satisfy potential demand for payments. However, most full-reserve banking money creation today are centralized initiatives at independent public institutions or banks. Kingdom Banking Plan facilitates a healthy credit system from a micro level and up while promoting self-sustaining communities.
fiat currency system
The fiat money is the de facto standard of current monetary system. The fiat money has become multifarious to the point that it becomes “too big to fail” for the governments. More and more cheap money is created at the cost of skyrocketing debt for nations. For 6000 years humans used gold as money. Today, money is dominated by fiat currencies and commercial bank deposits. Fiat currencies are the modern-day version of representative money. Since the 1970s the fiat currencies are not gold-backed. Vaults filled with gold have been replaced by trust and regulation.
asset-backed currency
Separating this vital function of money from a volatile currency environment helps address the problems of the current monetary system. For local economies to prosper and local communities to thrive there needs to be a bottom-up monetary infrastructure in local communities. Kingdom Bank Plan has a built-in infrastructure to back currency with tangible assets such as gold, silver, diamonds and few other assets, solving the current fiat currencies to function as a store of value.
centralized monetary system
The financial markets today have morphed into a complex system that includes the debt and equity markets, and complex financial instruments such as derivatives. They operate somewhat centralized by international banks and governments. Unhinged human behavior of greed supplemented by lack of proper checks and balances in money system affects millions of consumers plugged into the current economic system like in the recent 2008 Financial Crisis.
decentralized monetary system
Money unlocks the great increase in the quantity of work and labor. Currencies emerged as mediums of exchange due to division of labor. Adam Smith (1776) is credited with the origination of the decentralized exchange of money system. He proposed that a free exchange and price system within a decentralized market setting coordinates individual decisions and results in equilibrium that benefits all. Kingdom Bank Plan helps build decentralized and self-sustainable communities.
From Chicago Plan to Kingdom Banking Plan
The Chicago Plan legislative proposal of 1933 was one of the first initiatives against fractional reserve banking. It was brought up by reputed national economists as the Federal Reserve created in 1913 was not helpful in avoiding the crash of 1929.
One of the proposals of the plan was to segregate the demand accounts from savings accounts. Nonetheless the Chicago Plan died with the passage of 1935 New Deal Era banking legislation by FDR that regulated the activities of the private banking system. The FDIC and Glass Steagall Act were interim measures to bring some oversight early on. The focus of the governments since the World Wars shifted towards more macro level regulations like the Federal Open Market Committee and so on. Since the 2008 financial crisis, the Chicago Plan was revisited by IMF (international Monetary Fund) economists in 2012 but it went nowhere. However, the basic underlying issues still remain unresolved until today.
Diversify
Kingdom Bank Plan reduces the risk of toxic national currencies removing itself from the global debt system. The value of money as an exchange medium is integrated into building healthy and self-sustaining communities deploying checking accounts and savings accounts separately.
Segregate
Most of the systemic collapses that occurred in the current system is due to the huge casino the financial markets have grown over time. In the Kingdom Banking Plan the four functions of money tied in the current monetary system are segregated.
Separate
Separating this vital function of money from a volatile currency environment helps address the problems of the current monetary system. Breaking down the one giant monetary system into useful functions of money is similar to diversifying risk in portfolio management.
Transition from Market Economy & Socialism to Kingdom Economy
market Economy
Market Economy is the common form of Capitalism. It rides on the notion of economic scarcity. In a pure market economy, private individuals and businesses make these decisions and businesses continue to produce a good or service as long as there are willing consumers to buy the product. In Market Economy prices reflect the cost of production and the ability of consumers to afford the goods.
mixed economy
Mixed Economy is how most countries operate today with a mixture of government and private ownership. Some mixed economies are more capitalist in nature while others are not. In a Mixed Economy people are free to own their own businesses while the government intervenes as needed which is helpful to keep checks and balances. The recent 2008 Financial Crisis have seen unprecedented interference by Governments in bailing out banks. Intervention of the State in free markets have been going on much longer since the Great Depression. How much free hand does monetary policy actions by central banks and fiscal policy actions by the governments to stabilize output over the business cycle is a dilemma.
collaborative economy
One of the most influential economists of the 20th century, Joseph Schumpeter about 70 years ago predicted that competition in the Market Economy transitioning to what some call Sharing Economy or sometimes Collaborative Economy. The recent IPOs of companies operating technology platforms such as, UBER, Airbnb, facilitate Collaborative Economy. The advancement of IT and Information Sciences is the major enabler of Collaborative Economy. It is facilitated more by social capital than market capital to scale laterally, and is organized in a distributed and collaborative fashion. The corporate-dominated private sector utilizes the current economic system to manage private profit. Collaborative Economy preserves and enhances the commonwealth. The mixed market economy is transitioning to the Collaborative Economy.
biblical-oriented collaborative economy
The Collaborative Economy is about improving quality of existing resources while maintaining economies of scale. The corporate-dominated private sector is the status-quo of the current economic paradigm. Most companies exploiting the collaborative economy like Uber & Airbnb still apply a centralized strategy to stay profitable. Kingdom Banking facilitates a decentralized economy while being self-sustainable through a biblical-based collaborative economy.
Dealing With Economic Problems From a Macro-level Alone Does Not Bring Lasting Solutions
Most economic crises happen in the macro level that is mostly triggered by the few who can game and play the system. It benefits a few major players that include the big corporations and governments. The toxic assets that caused the 2008 Financial Crisis was one such example. In the 2008 crisis, the ones who were most hurt were the small and medium businesses and local communities. In the current financial system, local communities are left with little to no option than be dragged along with the macro level monetary problems.Trying to solve the banking and financial crisis from a macro level is the typical government approach. Since the recent 2008 Financial Crisis the central banks injected billions using Quantitative Easing(QE). QE triggered artificial valuation of equity markets through stock-buybacks which is reported to have increased the gap between the wealthy and the middle-class. QE also helped stock speculators by improving the EPS ratio without healthy growth.
The temporary measures taken from macro-level is not a long-term cure. In order to have a strong local economy that is less affected by inflation, currency wars and so on, the capitalization needs to grow strong from within the local economy. Thus the wholesale financial market made up of giant banks and corporations have only a minor effect on the local communities. For the healthy growth of any economy, the interest of all stakeholders, majority of them being consumers and end-users, need to be fairly represented rather than only addressed by major banks and central banks. Kingdom Banking is applied from bottom-up from a micro-economic level to solve this situation. It uses an integrated approach of micro-economy, micro-community, micro-banking, and micro-currency. Such temporary measures taken from macro-level is not long-term cure. In order to have a strong local economy that is less affected by inflation, currency wars and so on, the capitalization need to grow strong from within. Thereby the wholesale financial market made up of giant banks and corporations may only have little effect on the retail market in a future crisis. For the healthy growth of any economy, the interest of all stakeholders, majority of them being consumers and end-users, need to be fairly represented. The Kingdom Banking is applied from bottom-up from a micro-economic level to solve this situation using an integrated approach of micro-economy, micro-community, micro-banking, and micro-currency.
Micro-community
A community can be of any size and shape in today’s digital culture. A micro-community in the context of Kingdom Bank Plan is typically a community of a school-district size in a geographical location or an intentional community based on shared interests among its members. The purpose is to build a local self-sustainable economy. The community also shares governance, values and a purposeful culture.
Micro-economy
Microeconomics is about the bottom-up approach to economics. In the Kingdom Bank Plan, micro-economy is when businesses, households, and individuals within a micro-community allocate their limited and surplus resources efficiently and with other communities. It is about managing an economic infrastructure of a neighborhood applying both the microeconomic and macroeconomic principles. Kingdom Banking fosters cheaper small-scale production facilities using rapid prototyping.
Micro-banking
Micro-banking is generally associated with helping with micro businesses or the poor as viewed by governments and development agencies. Kingdom Bank Plan views micro-banking as a banking system for small and medium size communities by providing saving products, remittance and payment systems. It is a banking culture that considers the local economy holistically improving productivity and profits of Small and Medium businesses. It also fosters good stewardship of environment and social impact (including overall health of community members). It looks at economic resources within the community to maintain a self-sustainable economy.
Micro-currency
Micro-currency in Kingdom Banking Plan is the mechanism in which the value generated is being able to be exchanged and stored within a local community. This value that is created within a local economy can then be shared within and outside the community. Any such initiative is only beneficial if it can be exchanged with the common currencies whether national or international. This is the dilemma that many cryptocurrencies currently face. Kingdom Bank Plan has a solution to solve this issue.
Basic Functions
Kingdom Bank as an Ark
The word bank originally meant ‘bench’ or ‘shelf’. Jesus used the word banker (Trapezite in Greek) in Matthew 25:27. “Then you ought to have deposited my money with the bankers, and when I returned I would have gotten back what was mine with interest!” The word Trapezite comes from the Greek word “trapeza” which means counter. The Hebrew word for Trapezite is shulhani which also comes from the word Shulhan or table. In Italy the word BANCO was applied especially to a tradesman’s counter or a money-changer’s bench or table. The bankers those days were set in temples, shops and stalls in the public places as it served the purpose. By revisiting the basic functions of money as a starting point and marrying it to powerful technology tools that are available today, Kingdom bank identifies four characteristics that it caters to. Broadly speaking, Kingdom Bank is compared to an ark that can preserve the attributes of any asset that can be exchanged with money.
Trust
The Greek term Trapezite or banker was later replaced by the Latin term Argentarii. They performed several types of transactions including lending, holding deposits, determining the value, accounting etc. The kingdom bank basically serves as a people’s bank in micro-communities. Similar to the ‘for the people and by the people’ mantra, the Kingdom Bank instead of being the big brother in town, facilitates people’s money managed by the people.
Exchange
Without the function of exchange, the money or asset held, no matter how valuable it is, has no much value. Many crypto currencies today wrestle with the dilemma of exchange between other currencies and the various parties. Cryptocurrencies have vague intrinsic value and no real assets backing them. Kingdom Bank simplifies the economy of communities with value created being able to exchange with each other and national currencies as well.
Accounting
A bank should be able to keep the account of value and all related transactions for all members of its community. Kingdom Bank under full-reserve banking would not be permitted to lend out funds deposited in demand accounts. The demand account is not lent out but only time deposits by the consent of customers. Asset-backed accounting for time and demand deposits improve store and hedge against currency inflation, output gap and interest rates by central banks. The next generation of banking is able to provide services such as 1) accounting and 2) cash-flow analysis 3) Account payable and receivables to help better decision making in loan processing.
Store
Money is no money if it does not serve as a store of value. Compared with bartering goods you do not need to spend money immediately as the value needs to be held longer. Kingdom Bank handles the value of labor, products and value adjusted for economy with inflation, buying power with digital technologies. From the picture of the ark one of the main function is to preserve or store the value with transparency and security using fintech technologies in a way agreeable and fair without big banks as intermediaries’ much in control.
Money & Banking
Money and banking is a central component in the study of macroeconomics. In almost every banking and monetary reform the starting point in making the public money system is 1) through a central independent institution like the central bank or as determined by the government or 2) the notion that banks have to borrow money from creditors before being able to lend it out. Kingdom Banking Plan is different from both those approaches. It starts with the value of money as determined from a community level instead from a macro-level. It does not rely on fractional reserve banking and uses alternative means than the “borrow to lend” in banks today. “For the LORD your God will bless you, as he promised you, and you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow” (Deu. 15:6). The status quo banking system is based on borrowing and printing more money. Kingdom Banking Plan ensures current account deposits are backed by high quality liquid assets to ensure the safety of the payments system. It limits the effects of bank failure, and realign risk and returns. Also to provide healthy returns for private savings and loans than the current market rates.
A Banker’s Bank
In the conventional sense a banker’s bank is a bank that services a group of independent banks in order to set up a clearing cycle or a central bank that holds accounts for banks within its jurisdiction. The Kingdom Bank Plan is implemented as a people’s bank instead of waiting for governments to make reforms from top-down and protecting big banks that are too big to fail. Kingdom Bank is also an entity that acts as a banker’s bank to bring in the capital to small business and local community banks. Unlike the regular banks, the Kingdom Bank facilitates the core function of banking within kingdom communities using fintech technologies. To have a full-reserve banking system is to separate the savings and checking accounts backed by hard assets. The circulation of money in a local economy is mostly the demand or checking account. There is a need for alternative sources of capital to boost the local economies credit market. INK fintech Bank provides an alternative credit market lending to small and medium businesses to build strong local economies back after COVID. INK Bank aggregates alternative lenders to provide additional sources of capital to boost the local credit market.
INK Investments Fund
INK Investments as a form of diversification and hedge against economic uncertainty also invest in entities that innovate and produce basic sustenance goods.
Financial crisis and systemic crisis demands alternative investments in hard assets, energy and food production. Prevention is better than cure. It is better to be prepared in advance before a financial crisis and the looming debt crisis in the nations. Joseph had his distribution infrastructure in place well before the famine in Egypt.
INK Investment asset class strategies has ability to 1)preserve capital 2)appreciate in times of uncertainty and inflation and 3) fixed income revenue streams.
To meet the three keystones INK Investments uses a basket of Gold, Diamond, Real Estate, Energy, Fixed Income and in-the-ground assets in the fund structure. Income from the management of the fund feeds into Kingdom Bank credit market.
INK Investment also maintains a fintech-based micro-economy fund exclusively for funding community Kingdom banking.
Unlike the traditional government-funded infrastructure, Kingdom bank infrastructure is an asset class that backs services and facilities for micro-economy communities to function in self-sustainable fashion.
Mission
Invest in People and Infrastructure that will Reform Communities and Distribution of wealth.
Facilitate a financial system to boost economies outside the traditional credit programs.
Capital distribution from Kingdom Bank is for ventures of social impact and solving social problems in creative ways.
INK Investments is about nurturing companies that are doing good while doing well
Vision
To Empower Kingdom Communities Through A Community-based Digital Economy
Facilitate An Arbitraged Trade For Wealth Transfer From The Current Capital Markets To Kingdom Banking
To Be A Preferred Funder & Lender to Nations for Purposeful Projects.
Invest in People and Infrastructure that will Reform Communities and Distribution of wealth.
Values
Money is managed best when it is managed from Individual, Family and Community level and up. Properly managing the local economy from a community level is stabler than measures to print more money on a macro level. Macro level measures have fewer checks and usually reforms are done as a reactive measure which is unhealthy to the economy as a whole.
The Plan identifies the sustenance resources within a community. It uses a benchmark that identifies the demands and priorities based on must, should and may have needs to create a stable economy for building healthy communities. The resources available to sustain a local economy can vary from one community to another. The objective is to create a minimum viable economic infrastructure.
The Big Purpose Is To See Fruits of Reconciliation in Communities to Fulfill the Great Commission and Bless People through a Biblical-based Economy.
“For what is our hope, our joy, or crown of our glorying? Is it not you in the presence of our Lord Jesus when He comes?” 1 Thes 2:19.
Socialist egalitarianism is a concocted reality. It may sound great theoretically nonetheless remains a make-believe concept after many economists have sincerely tried different forms of it in the past decades. After two centuries since Karl Marx many economists and scientists still don’t want to give up on their socialist experiments. The Bible recognizes the reality of economic poverty. There were many poor people during Jesus’s times and still today.Being rich and poor insists that each person be treated with dignity and justice especially in moments when a person’s poverty is most evident (Deu. 15:11). Kingdom Banking’s economic model is neither about capitalism or socialism. It is about bringing fruits of reconciliation to individuals and communities through a biblical-based economy.
Get Started Today
If the Kingdom Banking resonates with you in any way we would love to hear from you. You don’t have to a banker or a specialist in technology to be part of this project. We look forward to hearing from you. Feel free to contact us below.