For most of modern financial history, the bank was the destination. Customers went to it for credit, accounts, and payments — and the bank, in return, owned the relationship. That architecture is now quietly being dismantled. Not by a new generation of banks, but by software companies that never set out to be banks at all. Shopify has deployed over $5 billion in merchant financing. Stripe underwrites loans from payment data. Square extends credit to sellers no traditional len