FinTech
Digital payments alone could become a $100 trillion industry, according to PwC. And that’s just one component of the global Fintech industry. This channel tackles the lenders and buyers, the obstacles and achievements, and the trends and trend makers leading the ongoing technological evolution in global finance.
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Robinhood (NASDAQ: HOOD) has launched its Crypto app in the European Union (EU), allowing eligible customers to engage in crypto trading with the added incentive of earning Bitcoin rewards. Customers stand to receive up to 1 BTC as a reward when signing up and can earn an additional 1 BTC for each successful referral. The platform claims to be the sole custodial crypto platform in the EU offering customers a percentage of their trading volume back every month, paid in Bitcoin.
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More Stories on FinTech
FinTech: Plaid Unveils Instant Account Updates For Plaid Exchange Users
Plaid is the fintech famous for its API that connects customers and their apps with their bank accounts. It is also the fintech for which Visa (NYSE: V) paid an acquisition price of $5.3 billion. Plaid announced Tuesday in a blog post that it was upgrading its Plaid Exchange service, which debuted in May. Banks and financial institutions, as well as their fintech partners, which use the service, can now provide real-time updates to their customers.
FinTech: PayPal Introduces “Pay in 4”, An Interest-Free BNPL Offering
PayPal (NASDAQ: PYPL) is getting into the Buy Now Pay Later sphere as consumers increasingly adopt the product, which is often used as a replacement for a credit card. On Monday, the payments giant announced “Pay in 4,” a short-term installment product that allows consumers to make a purchase and pay for it in four, interest-free installments.
FinTech: StartEngine Helped Everyday People Invest $200M in Startups
StartEngine, a securities crowdfunding platform, has helped raise $200 million for entrepreneurs and companies on its platform. The amount covered funding across 53 industries to 439 companies.
FinTech: Losses Escalate At Swedish Fintech and BNPL Provider Klarna
The red ink at Klarna, the Buy-Now-Pay-Later (BNPL) financing provider so popular with shoppers, is splashed rather prominently across its financial report for the six months ended June 2020. Expansion costs and provisions for losses on credits given to customers mainly accounted for the net loss of 522 million Swedish krona ($59.8 million) during the period. That’s up nearly 7X from its loss of 73 million krona in the same period last year.
FinTech: TipRanks and Markets.com Bring Quant Investing to Retail Investors
TipRanks, the Israeli data company and fintech that provides rankings on financial analysts, has tied up with Markets.com, an online broker, to bring quantitative models to the latter’s platform. Gone are the days when these sophisticated tools were available only to hedge funds and banks – the everyday investor can now dip their toes into the world of financial algorithm-powered investing.
FinTech: Global Payments Company WorldRemit Acquires Africa-Focused Sendwave
WorldRemit, a cross-border and worldwide payments processor, announced Tuesday its acquisition of Sendwave, an app-based remittance company that focuses on recipients in Ghana, Nigeria, Senegal and East Africa.
FinTech: Afterpay Buys European BNPL Provider Pagantis for €50M+
ASX-listed Afterpay Limited (ASX: APT) is making moves to expand into the Continent. According to a Monday announcement, its subsidiary Clearpay (Europe) Limited has acquired the entire shareholding in Pagantis SAU and PMT Technology SLU from NBQ Corporate SLU.
The companies (collectively referred as Pagantis) provide a range of buy now, pay later (BNPL) services, as well as traditional credit services, in the EU countries of Spain, France, and Italy. Pagantis also has regulatory approval to operate in Portugal.
FinTech: Checkout.com and Pakistan Payment Gateway NIFT Sign Deal
The Memorandum of Understanding is for collaboration between the two entities for Pakistan’s payment systems. National Institutional Facilitation Technologies, Pakistan (NIFT), and checkout.com have agreed to collaborate on cross-border payment solutions. (ProPakistani) Incorporated in September 1995 as a joint venture between a consortium of six major Pakistani banks and entrepreneurs from the private sector, NIFT…
FinTech: China’s Ant Group Reports Nearly $3.5B In Profits to June 2020
Ant Group, the holding company for Alipay, the mobile payment service with over 1 billion users, reported a solid streak of profitability during the first six months of 2020. The Jack Ma controlled company earned about 9.1 billion yuan ($1.3 billion) of profit in the recent June quarter and 15.3 billion yuan ($2.2 billion) in the preceding March quarter. These numbers have been derived from the results for the June quarter declared by Alibaba Group (NYSE: BABA), which holds 33% of Ant Group.
FinTech/Alternative Investments: Real Estate Loan Investing Platform PeerStreet Launches Credit Fund
PeerStreet, a platform for investing in real estate backed loans, was a pioneer in the field of fractional investing in real estate loans. The crowdfunding platform made the process of investing in real estate loans as simple as buying stocks. It offered investors the resources to create and structure their own customized real estate debt investment portfolios. In response to investor demand, PeerStreet has now launched the Peer Street Credit Opportunity, LP.
FinTech: Colibra Compensates You for Flight Delays, Now Also In Bitcoin
Colibra is a Bulgarian startup that aims to make compensations for flight delays accessible to any traveler in EU countries. Travelers using the app need to pay nothing upfront and can hope to get a fair and guaranteed chance at compensation if the flight is delayed by just an hour, even due to weather. The app has now extended the option for travelers to receive compensation in bitcoin.
FinTech: Thomson Reuters Acquires Virtual Courts Platform CaseLines
Thomson Reuters (NYSE: TRI) has acquired CaseLines, a digitized, cloud-based judicial platform that manages evidence, court documents, and virtual hearings.
FinTech/ESG: Solar Financier Loanpal Ties Up With Blackstone for $300M of Solar Loans
Loanpal, the fintech that is a market leader in financing of residential solar installations, announced Thursday that Blackstone (NYSE: BX) had committed to invest $300 million in solar loans originating on its platform. The amount committed will enable 10,000 homeowners to finance their solar systems, thereby reducing their homes’ carbon footprint.
Alternative Investments: iCapital To Provide Alternative Investment Solutions to PGIM’s Retail Clientele
PGIM Investments is the retail distribution arm of PGIM, Inc, the $1.4 trillion investment management business of Prudential Financial, Inc. (NYSE: PRU). It has tied up with iCapital Network, a financial technology platform focused on alternative investing, for a customized technology solution to support PGIM’s high net worth clients and financial advisors. The latter will get access to PGIM’s real estate, private credit, and other private alternative investment solutions, hitherto only available to the firm’s institutional clients.
FinTech: Done With Beta, Revolut Preps For Australian Launch
Revolut, the UK-based neobank led by Nikolay Storonsky, on Tuesday called an end to its beta mode operations in Australia. Country CEO Matt Baxby said the fintech was now readying for a launch of a “super app” in the country.
FinTech: American Express Eyeing SMB Lender Kabbage in $850M Deal
American Express (NYSE: AXP) the largest provider of credit cards to small businesses, is in advanced talks to acquire Kabbage, the online lender to small businesses, according to Bloomberg.
FinTech: Revolut Reports Robust Revenue Growth Even As Losses Triple
Revolut, the London fintech and neo bank, published its annual report for 2019 today. It reported a rather sizable loss of £107.4 million for the year. This was more than three times its loss during 2018, which was £32.8 million.
FinTech: Grab Financial Flags Off A Bouquet of New Services
Grab Financial Group Expands Suite of Products Under ‘Thrive with Grab’ Strategy
FinTech: UK-Based Wiserfunding Launches Credit Appraisal Tools For Indian SMEs
India’s SME sector has been rocked on its heels by the COVID-19 pandemic. It contributes to 45% of the country’s manufacturing output and over 28% of GDP while employing 111 million people. The pandemic can have catastrophic consequences for these businesses, which were already suffering from an economic slowdown before the virus. This may be a challenging environment for the introduction of high tech credit appraisal tools. But this is exactly what the UK fintech Wiserfunding is proposing to do.
FinTech: Intuit-Credit Karma Deal Under DOJ Lens (ProPublica)
According to ProPublica, a non-profit newsroom that investigates abuse of power, the US Justice Department will investigate Intuit Inc (NASDAQ: INTU)’s $7.1 billion acquisition of Credit Karma announced in February. Intuit is an American business and financial software company that develops and sells financial, accounting, and tax preparation software. It has a market capitalization of $81 billion. Credit Karma is a fintech that launched a free tax return service that became a formidable rival to Intuit.
Venture Capital: UK Fintech Curve Eyeing Fundraise Between £100m and £120m
Sifted revealed that London-based fintech Curve may raise an amount upwards of £100 million in a proposed Series C round. It reportedly started its efforts to raise money earlier this year and if the efforts pay off, it could be one of the biggest raises by a fintech in Europe this year amidst the pandemic.
FinTech: Apple Acquires Mobeewave To Extend Payments Functionality
Mobeewave, a Canadian tech startup that aims to convert smartphones into payment terminals, has been acquired by Apple Inc (NASDAQ: AAPL) for $100 million, according to Bloomberg.
The Mobeewave startup makes it easy for shoppers to use their credit cards and make payments using their smartphones. The firm will continue to function out of its Old Montreal location with all employees being retained by Apple.
FinTech: Monzo Reports A Whopper Of A Loss; Casts Doubt On Its Own Future
Monzo reported a loss of £113.8 million ($149.5 million) in its 2020 fiscal accounts, up from the £47.1 million loss in 2019. However, revenues more than tripled to £67.2 million from £19.7 million. The bank made sizable investments on hiring, marketing and a U.S. expansion during the year.
The bank warned that the disruption from the coronavirus pandemic had cast in doubt its ability to continue to operate.
FinTech: Seattle Mints Its Second Unicorn This Month in Remitly
Immigrant focused remittance fintech Remitly announced Wednesday that it raised $85 million in a Series F round led by existing investor Prosus’s PayU. Generation Investment Management, Owl Rock Capital, Stripes, DN Capital, Top Tier, Princeville Global, and Threshold Ventures also participated.