Payne was one of Twitter's first staffers, joining the firm in early 2007 as an engineer and played a major role in building its developer platform.

He now joins Josh Reich, the New York-based founder of data specialist i2pi, and Shamir Karkal at BankSimple which aims to take advantage of public disillusionment with financial services firms when it launches later this year.

BankSimple says it is "an easy, intuitive, and social bank for people who appreciate simple online services. Unlike other banks, we don't trap you with confusing products nor do we charge any hidden fees. No overdraft fees. We use sophisticated analytics to help you better manage your finances by providing you a individualized service, catered to your needs and goals."

On his blog, Payne says he's joining BankSimple to help create "a bank that doesn't suck". He continues: "In a nutshell, I'm going to make sure we build something that's simple, beautiful, and works really really well."

Ironically, the BankSimple Website crashed within hours of the news breaking, leading to the following tweet to Payne from the start-up: "If only we were able to hire you before we hired you, then we'd be set up to handle the traffic generated by hiring you."

Finextra verdict What do you get if your cross Twitter with a bank? We may be about to find out. Expect plenty of social media-friendly innovations, an open API, and mobile apps galore. But most of all, expect something really simple and intuitively easy to use. Traditional banks might want to watch this one closely. It will be interesting to see how it plays out.