Black-owned First Boulevard bank secures $5m ahead of its official launch
Part of its goal with the new capital involves building out a Black business marketplace.
Investment, Asset & Fund Management
Finix closes $3m Black and Latinx investor-led SPV
“This is very personal for me as a founder of colour,” says Finix founder.
Lloyds spends big on tech projects as profits slump 72%
The bank spent around £1.2bln on tech in 2020, equivalent to the profit it generated for the year.
What did the GameStop saga expose about UK trading regulation?
FinTech Futures unpacks the FCA’s published response to trading restrictions on 29 January.
Banking Tech Awards 2020 Winner: BTB – Best Use of IT in Private Banking/Wealth Management
BTB’s business model has brought annual average returns of 7% in the last seven years with low defaults.
Fintech funding deals globally 15-21 February 2021
Featuring Public, Webull, Blockchain, GoCardless, and Personetics.
Capital Group hires Marta Zarraga as new CIO
Zarraga has 25 years of industry experience at firms like Aviva, Vodafone and BT.
GameStop trader Deep F—ing Value, a licensed broker, sued for “fake persona”
The lawsuit accuses Gill of “deceitful and manipulative conduct”.
Swedish neobank Northmill raises $30m to power European expansion
The first stop along the way is a new product launch in Norway.
SoLo Funds snaps up $10m Series A for P2P lending
SoLo brought in $12m, which includes a $2.8m seed round and a series of convertible notes.
Danish edtech Female Invest targets UK expansion with $1.6m fresh capital
“It makes a big difference when you see someone like you on a platform.”
Six Black-owned banks receive funding from Well Fargo’s $50m MDI pledge
The banks will have access to a dedicated Wells Fargo relationship team.
Kenyan paytech Popote raises funding from GreenHouse Capital
The undisclosed amount of funding will help the paytech scale.
BLOC Smart Africa fund secures capital from Ivory Coast & Luxembourg
The fund will invest in high-growth potential start-ups to scale up across the continent.
Nigeria’s Xend Finance increases size of funding round to $2m
It initially launched its platform publicly late last year after raising $1.5 million in funding.
ICYMI funding round-up: Trade Ledger, Mesh, Safepay, Globacap & more
We round up some of the funding rounds that may have slipped you by.
Social impact app Tickr raises £2.5m
Tickr focuses on climate change, social impact and disruptive tech.
Fintech funding deals globally 1-7 February 2021
Featuring Stash, Built, LeaseLock, Valon Mortgage, and Metromile.
US investor Stash lands $125m Series G ten months after last round
Stash’s last valuation sits at around $812 million.
Cross-border payments fintech Payoneer to IPO with $3.3bn Spac merger
Payoneer is reportedly profitable and expects to pull in $432 million in revenues this year.
What the Fintech? | S.2 Episode 3 | Israel’s mobile lending tech scene
Featuring Shlomi Turgeman, founder and CEO of BTB Israel.
PayKey integrates investment and loan services on mobile keyboards
Clients include Standard Chartered, UniCredit, HSBC and ING.
Supply chain financing start-up CapBay raises $20m in Series A
CapBay offers short-term financing to “businesses of all sizes” through its “proprietary credit-decisioning model”.
Nigerian wealthtech Cowrywise raises $3m pre-Series A
The co-founders aim to democratise Nigerians’ access to savings and investment products.
Fintech funding deals globally 25-31 January 2021
Featuring Robinhood, Nubank, Melio Payments, Albert and Rhino.
New funding for European fintechs Compeon and SESAMm
Germany-based Compeon lands €15 million and France-based SESAMm – €7.5 million.
HSBC, Microsoft, and Santander back Included VC’s diversity fellowship
The fellowship’s latest 48-person-strong cohort is 18 more than last year.
Hesta selects SimCorp Dimension to power new portfolio strategy
Australian superannuation firm brings investments in-house.
Online brokers halt GameStop trades as SEC investigates
The SEC is “actively monitoring” the “ongoing market volatility”.
Stripe leads big investment in one-click checkout fintech Fast
Two-year-old Fast has enjoyed exponential growth in the last year.
Kenyan agri-insurtech Pula raises $6m Series A
The funding round was led by Pan-African early-stage venture capital firm, TLcom Capital.
Wealthtech Elinvar raises €25 million funding
Founded in 2016 in Berlin, Elinvar has “the vision to connect the entire wealth management ecosystem”.
Zip boosts Aussie exchange to 11-month high with $56m share purchase
The BNPL firm raised $26m in oversubscriptions, at $5.29 a share.
FinTech Futures Jobs: new year, new job – five tech companies that are hiring now
Featuring CGI, Cleo AI, Freetrade, Market Finance, and Monzo.
Affirm IPO sees shares surge 98%
Affirm managed to halve its losses by June 2020.
Freetrade pauses trading for US stocks following technical issues
Some investors woke up to their US stocks up over 2000%.
JP Morgan in talks with China Merchants Bank over another wealthtech venture
JP Morgan already holds a majority stake in a Chinese venture.
Arab Investment Bank picks fresh batch of Temenos solutions
Egypt-based bank adds to existing portfolio of Temenos products.
InvestSuite raises €3m in third seed funding round
Wealthtech firm plans to take advantage of a digitising industry.
What the Fintech? Season one | Fintech Jail
Here’s a list of all the buzzwords in our What the Fintech podcast game, “Fintech Jail”.
