Visualize the balance sheets of US banks

Visualizing the world's wealth in 2019

The world has a net worth of $360T. The U.S. economy continues to dominate given its sheer size, Asia and Europe are not that far behind.

League tables show the number of deals top investment banks do in a time period

These tables provide a visual to help keep track of the leading companies in investment banking. Companies such as JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs typically sit up top.

Explaining the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank

In March 2023, Silicon Valley Bank—the nation's 16th largest bank at the time—collapsed after a rapid run on its deposits. Among other factors, the bank had placed more than half of its investments into long-term bonds, leaving it without the necessary cash on hand as its clients, largely start ups, panicked and withdrew their money at the same time. This visualization lays out the timeline and impact of the collapse.

Find out how airlines quietly became banks

Some experts suggest airlines lose money on every flight. This video dives into how airlines have leveraged their loyalty programs to make billions of dollars, effectively evolving into banks.

Banks make money by loaning customer deposits and earning interest

This means the interest you earn on your deposits is lower than what the bank earns on the same amount. Banks often keep cash reserves (though a minimum requirement was rescinded in 2020) but generally invest in government bonds, corporate securities, and loans to other banks. During bank runs, depositors withdraw more than the bank has on hand.

Facts and figures on the largest credit unions

As of early 2024, credit unions had $2.31T in assets under management and were growing exponentially. Some of the biggest players limit access to military personnel, residents of specific states, and those with active religious affiliations. If you want to bank with some of the top names in the US, this list will help you check to see if you qualify.

The Federal Reserve is the most powerful financial institution in the US

The Fed controls the money supply, determines interest rates, and regulates the banking system. Established in 1913 after a volatile series of financial panics, the central bank has managed to retain its legitimacy despite broad critiques against its obscure and independent decision process.

Where colleges get their money, visualized

If you're curious about how different colleges and universities generate their revenue, this National Center for Education Statistics webpage offers a clear visual breakdown. See how public, private nonprofit, and for-profit institutions fund their operations, highlighting the differences between funding sources depending on the type of institution.

Near-universal banking masks a large underbanked shadow system

FDIC data indicates 128 million households have a checking account, the vast majority (96% in 2024). But more than 14% of households are underbanked, meaning they have accounts but also rely on nonbank services such as check cashing, payday loans, or prepaid cards.

Just 7% of student loan borrowers account for 40% of outstanding student loan debt

Most student loan debt went to support graduate studies. Total student loan debt in the US is more than $1.6T. Downloadable tables show the raw data behind federal student aid.

Roughly 43 million US borrowers owe roughly $1.7T in student debt, the second-largest source of consumer debt behind mortgages.

The US dollar is the most widely circulated currency in the world, and is involved in nearly 90% of global transactions

Visualizing US state taxes in seven charts

Ever wondered how your state’s tax system compares to others? Here’s an overview of the US state tax system based on seven visualizations.

See a visual of the largest airlines in the US by market share

As of November 2024, Delta Airlines controlled roughly 17.8% of US airline market share, while American Airlines controlled about 17.5%, and Southwest controlled about 17.3%. Spirit Airlines, which would go on to shutter operations in 2026, controlled less than 5% of US airline industry market share at the time.

How AI is revolutionizing banking

Generative artificial intelligence has left no industry untouched, and banking isn’t an exception. Experts estimate that gen AI could add as much as $340B in value to the banking sector each year. For consumers, this involves new features to prevent fraud and customer service chatbots. This report dives into the revolution underway and seeks to define a “full stack” AI bank of the future. Read more here.

The average American household spends $6,545 per month

While the median household income is $84K, the typical bank account balance is $8K.

The Glass-Steagall Act separated commercial banks in the US from investment banks

In 1933, the Glass-Steagall Act legally separated commercial banks in the US from investment banks. However, by 1999, the act was repealed—meaning that today’s investment banks are no longer required to be separate from the type of bank where you deposit your paycheck.

NBA players are the best paid athletes in major US sports

The NFL is the most valuable pro league in the world, but its players aren’t making nearly as much as NBA players. This CNBC video dives into how league structure, salary cap, and guaranteed contracts define how much an athlete will make, and shows how NBA players are able to use those to get almost double the average annual salary of other pro leagues.

Visualizing 40 years of interest rates

The history of interest rates are a proxy of macroeconomic conditions, with higher interest rates indicating periods of decline requiring artificial central stimulation. In a series of charts illustrating rates and their background conditions, you can see the movement of the economy over a forty-year period ending in 2020. Dive into the data here.

The US jobs with the highest union membership rates

The transport and construction industries, as you might have guessed, have particularly high rates of union membership. But do you know the broadcasting industry’s union participation rate, at roughly 10%, isn’t far behind? This visual depicts the US industries with the highest rates of union membership in the country.

Facebook dominated US social ad spend in the first half of 2024

This data visualization shows the social media platforms where advertisers spent the most money in the first six months of 2024, with Facebook leading the pack taking home 36.3% of US social ad spend.

How art-backed loans work

Using your art collections—some of which are valued in the millions—to secure a loan is becoming more common among collectors. Here's a breakdown on how banks and private lenders are making best of the opportunity in liquidity.

Bank of America helped establish Visa as a global credit card network business after it rolled out its first credit cards.

At the time, those credit cards were called "BankAmericards." Today, Bank of America owns less than a 2% share of Visa—many other banks (as well as institutional investors) help govern and profit from the network.

Explore an interactive tool that reveals why Americans are unemployed

Among unemployed Americans ages 25 to 54, almost 30% cited being laid off as the reason for their unemployment.

Understanding the low corporate tax rate in the US

Corporate taxes, which make up roughly a third of the federal government's revenue, have been calculated using a flat 21% rate since the Tax Cuts & Jobs Act of 2017. The current rate is considered low both by historic standards (it averaged over 50% in the 1950s and 1960s) and compared to other countries.

Federal subsidies have boosted US fracking profits

Between 2000 and 2020, the US government invested tens of billions of dollars to facilitate the extraction of shale oil and gas reserves. These subsidies helped make new projects viable and kept fossil fuel companies afloat while global energy prices and renewable energy startup costs have fallen.

Amazon's largest profit engine is the cloud-computing platform Amazon Web Services

Also known as AWS, Amazon Web Services is a suite of IT resources such as storage, databases, and more. While Amazon owns AWS, lots of other tech companies—including Slack and Pinterest—use it to help run their IT operations. In 2023, AWS brought in $25B in profit—outpacing Amazon's entire North American retail division.

Hedge funds, the private investment firms that trade a wide swath of financial assets, make money by imposing steep fees on investors and from the fund's investment performance.

See a ranking of the best (and worst) Federal Reserve Chairs since 1914 out of the 16 men and women who have held the office since.

Learn how to read a prospectus, the juicy document that any company must file with the SEC before going public.

Watch this video that uses Lego bricks to explain how venture capital works.

Netflix profits when you're not watching, and its movies are designed that way—read a detail-rich critical essay exposing lesser-known Netflix takes

The United States is one of only around two dozen countries with a fully federal system of government, in which power is divided between national and state governments.

The Nasdaq's 'Magnificent 7' companies are responsible for roughly 40% of the Nasdaq 100 index's gains, while the remaining 93 companies account for the other 60%.

The USPS spent $3.97B in 2024, accounting for .058% of the federal budget.

Explore an interactive map built from more than 100,000 survey responses on where people find joy in their lives

See how each of the more than two million known species relates to each other—and to common ancestors—in this zoomable tree of life.

The American Society of Civil Engineers' infrastructure report card gave the US a C in 2025, its highest grade since the project launched in 1998.

View the ten deadliest tornadoes in US history.

Most of the observable universe's volume consists of voids and supervoids—enormous regions of space with little to no galaxies, stars, or light.

Louisiana's 'Cancer Alley' is infamous for having some of the highest industrial pollution, toxic air emissions, and cancer risks in the US.

Art theft is the third-largest source of criminal revenues worldwide, thanks in part to the subjective nature of valuing a work of art.

Browse a detailed visual analysis of over 200,000 similes—comparisons that often use 'like' or 'as'—from popular fiction to see how frequently writers the same idiomatic expressions.

In 2025, four executives from large tech companies were given positions in the US Army Reserves—including Palantir Chief Technology Officer Shyam Sankar, which reinforced Palantir's ties with the US military and its role as a leading defense partner.

Electrical grids worldwide must double their power delivery capacity by 2050 to meet surging demand from AI and electric vehicles.

As of 2025, the most cited papers in science include a review of graphene, methods to improve image recognition, streamlining electron density calculations, and optimizing protein studies.

Ebola infects and disables immune cells, triggering a cascade of events that leads to small blood clots throughout the body, weakening blood vessels and interrupting blood flow to key organs.

Telehealth demand for GLP-1s for weight loss is booming as consumers seek easier access.

See how Budweiser's famous Clydesdales spend their days at Warm Springs Ranch, where roughly 70 to 80 of the beer brand's giant horses can be found at any given time.

Watch how deep-sea mining equipment collects and processes polymetallic nodules—metal-rich, potato-shaped rocks—from the ocean floor and creates environmentally damaging plumes of sediments.