Question on Correspondent Banking for Small Digital Banks

Hey everyone, I've been doing a lot of reading on offshore and digital banking, and I'm a bit fuzzy on the practicalities of correspondent banking for smaller, newer digital banks. It seems like a major hurdle to get established with a tier-1 bank for these services, especially with the increased compliance burden. For those of you involved with setting up these structures, what strategies have you found most effective for securing reliable correspondent relationships when you don't have a massive balance sheet or decades of operating history?