Stay up to date with the latest news from fintech! This week, we bring you updates and developments on partnerships, lending, banking, crypto, NFT and more. Enjoy reading!
Brex acquires bookkeeping software firm Pry Financials for $90m (Fintech Futures)
US fintech Brex has acquired Pry Financials, a software platform that provides budgeting, forecasting and bookkeeping tools, for $90 million. The deal will see Brex expand its software offering for founders, enabling users to project cash flow, track budgets and scenario plan using dashboards and visualisations. “Pry was designed from the ground up to help founders understand their business simply and efficiently. To help them scale, raise their next round of funding or plan an exit,” says Brex CEO and co-founder Henrique Dubugras. Read more.
Alibaba’s Ant Group Buys Majority Stake In Singapore Fintech 2C2P (Forbse)
Ant Group—backed by Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba—has agreed to acquire a majority stake in Singapore-based fintech company 2C2P as the operator of e-wallet Alipay expands further into Southeast Asia. “This partnership is a win-win collaboration built on strengths and the shared vision to accelerate the digital transformation for businesses through innovation and best-in-class payments solutions,” Angel Zhao, president of Ant Group’s International Business Group, said Monday in a statement. “We look forward to supporting businesses’ digitalization together and creating a connected digital ecosystem across markets in the region.” Read more.
U.K. Crypto Regulators Turn to Fintech Playbook for Inspiration (Bloomberg)
Britain’s prior approach to regulating financial technology has been held up as the de-facto bar, industry executives told Bloomberg – but on crypto, its more risk-averse outlook has stymied the sector’s growth. The Financial Conduct Authority and the Bank of England have issued multiple consumer warnings about investing in crypto since token prices picked up in 2020, while efforts to assess the underlying blockchain technology’s suitability for updating traditional market infrastructures only began in earnest last year. Only 34 crypto firms surpassed the FCA’s bar for registration under anti-money laundering rules, with more than 100 companies left in limbo. Read more.
Sainsburys Bank Partners With Fintech Scotland To Deliver Better Customer Outcomes Through Collaboration (Scottishbusinessnews)
FinTech Scotland announced Sainsbury’’s Bank is joining its group of strategic partners. The strategic collaboration with Fintech Scotland will enable the supermarket bank to collaborate with innovative leaders in technology, helping to shape future customer propositions. This builds on the strategic digital emphasis of Sainbury’s Bank in recent years, including the transformation of operational systems and platform to best serve its customers. Read more.
Featurespace and Monavate in FinTech alliance (Business Weekly)
Cambridge-born and based technology companies Featurespace and Monavate have partnered to embed the former’s world-leading fraud solution ARIC Risk Hub in full-service issuing platform Monavate One. The partnership gives Monavate customers access to Featurespace’s fraud services direct from the platform. Featurespace’s ARIC Risk Hub will sit alongside a suite of complementary issuing services all within a single portal. The Monavate platform will provide card issuance, processing, IBANs, data analytics, card fulfilment and more for the E2E setup, launch and scaling of fintech-led card products. Read more.
PayU acquires Ding and invests in Treinta to boost presence in Latin America (Fintech Futures)
PayU has announced the acquisition of Colombian paytech Ding as well as an investment in fellow Colombian firm Treinta in a bid to strengthen its presence in Latin America. With the acquisition of online payments specialist Ding, PayU aims to accelerate innovation and competition within the digital payments industry in Colombia by strengthening the country’s digital economy and providing market entry for SMEs who were previously unable to access traditional financial services. The firm says it also contributed to Treinta’s recent $46 million funding round. Read more.
UK paytech MYPINPAD merges with Singapore’s SmartPesa (Fintech Futures)
UK-based paytech MYPINPAD and Singapore’s SmartPesa have merged in a bid to become a “global leader in mobile payments acceptance” and develop mobile payments solutions for customers and merchants at scale. MYPINPAD provides secure payments acceptance and personal authentication solutions using smartphones and tablets. The new combined entity, which will operate under the MYPINPAD brand, will double its existing footprint in the Asia-Pacific, Latin America, Europe, Middle East and Africa regions, with a view to expand into North America in 2022. SmartPesa develops payments and agency banking solutions for merchants and banks, providing a mobile-based one-stop tool for accepting multi-channel payments online and offline. Read more.
Robinhood Signs Deal to Acquire UK Crypto App Ziglu (Lendacademy)
Robinhood, a major US commission-free stock trading and investing app, announced that it reached an agreement to acquire the London-based fintech app, Ziglu. According to CNBC, the app allows users to trade Bitcoin (BTC) and other cryptocurrencies. The acquisition comes in the midst of the platform’s expansion into the UK and Europe, as the plans were halted two years ago. “Like Robinhood, Ziglu believes that the new era of digital money brings a multitude of opportunities, and Ziglu exists to make those opportunities accessible to everyone. Their talented team and technology will help us accelerate our international expansion, both in the UK and across Europe,” the stock trading and investing app pointed out in the blog post. Read more.
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