For this piece, we analyzed the most recent news from fintech and selected the top relevant insights for you. As main highlights, this week was marked by the extended commercial agreement between Artel Africa and Mastercard, new NFT protocol launched by Consensys, strategic partnership between Celnonis and IBM, sharp fall in Atos’s shares, new payment options added by ABN AMRO, Clubhouse adding payment, Microsoft overhauling ID verification, and Allfunds listing on Euronext Amsterdam. Happy reading!
Airtel Africa signs deal with Mastercard valuing mobile money at US$2.65bn (€2.23bn) (Proactive)
Mastercard will invest $100m (€84m) in Airtel Africa’s subsidiary Airtel Mobile Commerce BV (AMC BV). The transaction values Airtel Africa’s mobile money arm at $2.65bn (€2.23bn) on a cash and debt free basis. Alongside this investment, Airtel Africa and Mastercard have extended commercial agreements and signed a new commercial framework covering several countries and business areas including card issuance, payment gateway, payment processing, merchant acceptance and remittance solutions. Read more
ConsenSys Launches New NFT Art Protocol (Decrypt)
ConsenSys, the Ethereum studio behind MetaMask, Treum, and Infura, has announced a new NFT protocol called Palm, with accompanying $PALM token. It is said that the Palm network (an Ethereum sidechain) is “99% more efficient than Layer 1 Ethereum”. The protocol is the result of a partnership between ConsenSys and HENI, a multi-pronged art services company. Read more
Celonis forms strategic partnership with IBM (VentureBeat)
Celonis, a process mining software startup, has struck a strategic partnership with IBM to help companies make the most of the digital transformation that many are undergoing at speed. IBM’s Global Business Services will weave the Celonis Execution Management System into its offering, adding the ability to analyse data by processes like supply-chain management, finance, or procurement. Celonis will also shift its software stack to IBM’s Red Hat OpenShift platform which enables companies to operate in an open “hybrid” setting that can include public or private cloud datacenters, on-premise servers, and mainframe computers. Read more
Atos’ shares slump 18% after accounting issues disclosed (Reuters)
Atos, a French IT consulting firm, witnessed a sharp decrease in its shares after the company disclosed that auditors had found accounting errors at two of the firm’s US units. The shares were down 18% in early trading on the Paris bourse, then recovered some ground and were trading down 13.8% this week. Read more
ABN AMRO adds Google Pay to its payment options (Ibs Intelligence)
ABN AMRO will be adding Google Pay to its payment options. The bank’s clients will soon be able to pay quickly and easily for in-person, in-app and online purchases using their Android smartphone within the ABN AMRO app, at no extra charge. ABN AMRO, recently, along with Rabobank are collaborating with TNO on a project called Multi-Party Computation for Anti Money Laundering (MPC4AML). Read more
Microsoft bids to overhaul ID verification (Finextra)
Microsoft is working with a host of ID verification firms including Jumio, Onfido and Socure to use the technology to make it possible to verify an identity once and present it to anyone. Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) verifiable credentials offers an open standards-based approach to organisations re-using verified information about a person. With this, firms can design and issue verifiable credentials to represent proof of claims. Then, the holder of the credential can decide when, and with whom, to share it. Read more
Clubhouse adds payments (Finextra)
Clubhouse, an audio-based social media startup, has enlisted Stripe to add a feature that lets users send money to speakers. All Clubhouse users can now send money, although only a small test group can currently receive payments. The sender will be charged a small processing fee by Stripe but Clubhouse says that it will take nothing, ensuring the recipient receives 100% of the payment. Read more
Allfunds to list on Euronext Amsterdam (Finextra)
Allfunds, the UK-based B2B WealthTech platform, is to list on the Euronext Amsterdam stock exchange. The company has built an ecosystem that covers the entire fund distribution value chain and investment cycle, including via Allfunds Connect, a full suite of SaaS-enabled digital, data and analytics tools. Allfunds believes the listing will provide access to diversified sources of funding and raise its profile and brand awareness. Read more
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