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Global FinTech News - 14th of May 2021

Global FinTech News - 14th of May 2021
By Holland FinTech  • Issue #98 • View online
Dear reader,
While early on this week, the world was looking at the computer hack that caused the colonial oil pipeline to go out of business, putting a large part of the US without fuel, the escalating Israel-Gaza violence has taken over the center stage globally. Covid-19 is under control in many Western countries, due to increasingly larger parts of populations being vaccinated. However, India is experiencing a record-breaking surge in Covid-19 cases and deaths.
We focus again on the news in fintech, exploring the newest trends from fintech - M&A, payments, tokens, banking, remittances, trade finance, and more!
This Friday morning, our Founder & CEO, Don Ginsel, dived into open banking, sustainable finance, ESG, a potential GDPR 2.0, identity solutions and more topics in the financial services with James Varga, CEO at DirectID. Check out the video recording here.
From the Holland FinTech Team, we wish you a nice end of the week!

Highlights from last weeks news related to fintech
Data sharing deals, fintech partnerships, cryptocurrency exchange, remittances, US stable coin, regulations for debt-based crowdfunding in Saudi Arabia, NFTs and anti-money laundering. Dive into the selected materials below:
  • PayPal is expanding its partnership with Google Cloud, which will provide PayPal with both infrastructure and analytics capabilities to help it process transactional data at massive scale
  • Google announced that Google Pay users in the U.S can now send money to Google Pay users in India and Singapore
  • Visa invested in Remitly, a cross-border payment provider, to help the digital remittance outfit expand its network in emerging markets
  • The Diem Association, backed by Facebook, abandons Swiss license application, will move to the U.S. The company has also announced a new partnership with Silvergate Capital, to launch a US dollar stablecoin
  • Adyen, a global payments platform, announced the launch of Planet, which allows shoppers to offset the carbon footprint of their purchases in the checkout process
  • The Saudi Central Bank (SAMA) issued new regulations for debt-based crowdfunding
  • Revolut continues to build out its product suite, adding a browser extension that helps customers to get discounts at the checkout
  • Better, a digital mortgage lender, will make its market debut by merging with Aurora Acquisition Corp., valuing the company at $7.7 billion (€6.34Bn)
  • Microsoft’s Azure Blockchain as a Service is going to be shut down on September 10, 2021
  • The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) is seeking to expand testing of the digital asset after the successful completion of an initial pilot program to test the use of the digital yuan across borders
  • Snyk, an open source software vulnerability scanning platform, has acquired FossID, a Swedish startup that develops a software composition analysis tool for open source code
Read more about this week’s news HERE.
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The largest funding rounds we found from across the world
Multiple deals, funding series, and investments. This week has emphasized sub-industries from fintech such as crypto, AI, payments, financial management solutions, blockchain. Dive into the funding rounds, ranging from 5 May to 12 May:
  • Bullish Global (New York, New York, US), a crypto exchange platform and a newly formed subsidiary of Block.one, raised a $300M (€247M) round
  • Acronis (Schaffhausen, Switzerland), a global technology company that unifies data protection and cybersecurity, has raised $250 million (€206M) in equity
  • Shift Technology (Paris, France), a platform that delivers AI-native decision automation, has raised $220 million (€181M) in a Series D round led by Advent International
  • CloudWalk (São Paulo, Brazil), a payment technology network, raised $190m (€157M) in Series B funding
  • HoneyBook (San Francisco, CA, US), a client experience and financial management platform for independent service-based businesses, raised $155m (€128M) in Series D equity funding
  • Solana Blockchain (San Francisco, CA, US), a web-scale blockchain that provides decentralized apps and marketplaces, received $100M (€82M)
  • Visa invested in Remitly, a cross-border payment provider, to help the digital remittance outfit expand its network in emerging markets
  • Other fundings we found interesting include: Lili (€45M), ADA (€49M), Babel Finance (€33M), FinLync Raises (€13M), Coin Metrics (€12M), Fly Now Pay Later (€12M), API (€10M), Bitpanda (€8M)
Read more about this week’s funding news HERE.
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A selection of recent research reports and papers worth reading
Crunch the latest numbers and statistics with the below reports, investigating consumer payment behaviors, Big Techs, ESG, digital banking, and digital transactions:
  • “COVID Triggers changes in payments habits amongst 80% of consumers” (PCM) - This report shows that more than eight in ten consumers (86%) say that their payments habits have changed since the start of the pandemic, with 59% trying a new payment method for the first time
  • “More than 100 million Americans will use proximity mobile payments in 2021” (Insider Intelligence) - This paper reveals that the pandemic has not only altered consumers’ shopping behaviors, but it also changed how they pay for goods and services
  • “Big Tech’s Playbook: Where Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft, Google, And Apple Are Investing & Acquiring — And What It Signals About The Future” (CBinsights) - This report digs into where Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft, Google, and Apple (FAMGA) are investing, to analyze their strategies across the cloud and retail.
  • “Collaborating to win in Canada’s Fintech ecosystem” (Accenture) - This paper looks back at 2020 to analyse the Canadian fintech ecosystem while examining trends that may shape the future of the ecosystem
  • “Fintech, ESG and IFCS: Embedding Sustainable Business Models” (Finextra.com) - This report emphasizes that the Covid-19 has brought ESG into sharper focus and accelerated its adoption to continue financing and supporting economic growth
  • “Digital Transformation: 68% of Singapore Consumers Prefer All-Digital Channels when Engaging with their Bank during Financial Hardship” (Crowdfund Insider) - This study carried out a survey of over 5000 digital banking clients in 10 key Asia-Pacific (APAC) nations, which includes Singapore
  • “India Digital Payments Report” (Bankingfrontiers.com) - This report gives an in-depth look at digital transactions in India in 2020 as well as insights on transactions that were processed on our network
Read more about research papers HERE.
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Background information and insights from opinion leaders and experts
More insights from industry leaders and voices in the fintech ecosystem, emphasizing topics such as insurance, banking, trade finance, cyber security, regulations:
  • “How embedded finance can be transformational for insurance” via Finextra - Hasan Nawaz, CEO at HUBUC, explores a post-digital world for the insurance industry where digitalization isn’t a new topic for people and is no longer a differentiator or a competitive advantage for organisations
  • “How Community Banks Compete on Digital Account Openings” via BankDirector.com - Nathaniel Harley, CEO and co-founder at MANTL, highlights that digital account openings are only one piece of a steady shift in the financial services industry
  • “Digitising trade finance: the next frontier for financial services innovation” via Fintech Futures - John Mitchell, CEO and Co-founder of Episode Six, dives into the adoption of new technologies in trade finance
  • “Keeping the pandas, kittens and spiders out of the financial services industry: A hot target for cyber criminals and nation-states in 2021” via Fintech Business - Scott Jarkoff, Director and Strategic Threat Advisory at CrowdStrike, emphasized that financial services leaders should be aware of a number of recurring cyber attacks
  • “Insurers Are Waking Up to Multi-Factor Authentication” via Carrier Management - Steven Kaye,Vice President of Research at Novarica, reveals that legislators and regulators are increasingly mandating multi-factor authentication (MFA) to ensure greater security as well as to reduce identity theft and other forms of fraud
  • “Cybersecurity is too big a job for governments or business to handle alone” via World Economic Forum - Paul Mee, Leader Partner of Cyber Risk at Oliver Wyman and Chaitra Chandrasekhar & Partner of Financial Services & Public Sector at Oliver Wyman, concluded that business and government are exposing each other to an increased range of cyber-risks, and the current effort to pool cybersecurity resources are limited in scope
Read more about these analyses & opinion pieces HERE.
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Connect with the fintech ecosystem at some of the upcoming events
Amsterdam Fintech Week (XFW) is a project for the fintech community, by the fintech community. So whether you run a startup or work at an insurer or a bank, whether you care about payments or pensions or whether you are a techie or a business person - this week is for you!
Get involved HERE.
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Finnovex Europe - 24th - 25th May 2021
Finnovex is a series of Summits that examines the Future of Financial Services on how disruptive innovations are reshaping the way they are structured, provisioned and consumed.
Register HERE.
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Digital Transformation in Banking Summit - 27th - 28th May
We are proud to host our 3rd Digital Transformation in Banking Summit, jointly represented by 25 leading speakers from Europe and a qualified gathering 200 attendees.
Register HERE.
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CB Insights Tech Market: Digitizing P&C Insurance - 13th - 14th May 2021
Join 400 peers for an online innovation & tech showcase designed for property and casualty execs responsible for making tech strategy & buying decisions.
Register HERE
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AccountingTech Hybrid Meet Up - Bizzabo - 20th May 2021
An event dedicated to AccountingTech This hybrid MeetUp explores the evolution of accounting tech and how the automation it brings, will ultimately change accounting processes and the accountant’s role. What impact will it have on other business processes?
Register HERE
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Ready to get involved? Click here to find out more.
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