Claude Adds Bank Connections For Personal Finance Questions
Anthropic is rolling out a US beta that lets paid Claude subscribers connect financial accounts through Plaid to review spending, balances and transactions.
Anthropic is adding a Personal Finance feature to Claude that lets users connect bank and credit card accounts through Plaid and ask questions about their money. The feature is rolling out in beta this week to Pro, Max and Ultra subscribers in the US, according to TechCrunch, The Verge and Engadget. Anthropic says the connection is read-only: Claude cannot move, manage or invest users’ money.
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What Claude can do with connected accounts
Users can ask where their money went over a given month and receive a spending breakdown across connected accounts. TechCrunch says Claude can group transactions into categories such as rent and utilities, food and drink, and shopping, then answer follow-up questions about whether that spending is unusual.
The tool can also look for duplicate charges, unexpected fees and bills that have risen over time, according to TechCrunch and Engadget. The Verge reports that users can ask what bills remain before their next payday, whether a large purchase is affordable and how much they might be able to save each month. Engadget says Claude can produce weekly spending charts, expense calendars and budget breakdowns. It can also explain financial terms such as APR.
Access and privacy limits
Connecting an account gives Claude access to the bank’s name, account names and types, the last four digits of account numbers, balances, credit limits and up to two years of transaction history, Anthropic says, as reported by TechCrunch and The Verge. The Verge says Plaid handles the connection, so Claude does not see users’ banking passwords.
Anthropic says conversations in the Personal Finance hub are not used to train its models, according to TechCrunch and Engadget. Engadget adds that material shared with Claude outside the hub remains subject to a user’s existing privacy settings. The company says Personal Finance has no ads or sponsored recommendations and does not offer its own credit cards, loans or savings accounts. Despite the range of questions it can answer, Anthropic says the tool is not designed to give investment advice.
How it fits into the market
The launch follows a similar ChatGPT personal finance feature introduced by OpenAI in May, which also connects to accounts through Plaid, according to all three reports. Engadget reports a difference in data handling: OpenAI applies users’ existing data controls to its finance feature, while Anthropic excludes conversations inside its Personal Finance hub from model training.
Anthropic is also considering ways for Claude to work alongside licensed professionals and regulated firms on larger financial decisions, The Verge and Engadget report. The company has invited banks, wealth managers and other financial services firms to help shape that work, but has not described a specific future product.
Sources
This story was compiled by AI from the reports below. Read the originals for the full details.