FinTech Europe | 2022 #49
Weekly news up to Tuesday, December 6th, 2022
For the past week’s funding news overview, we recommend reading our weekly #DoneDeal newsletter 👇
👀 Are you interested in funding news from the FinTech space?
💡 Read all about it in my weekly overview article and get the latest funding news from the global FinTech space in your inbox every week.
REPORT
Fintech for Sustainable Finance:
This joint study of the Luxembourg House of Financial Technology and Deloitte Luxembourg explores the role that financial technologies can play in supporting financial institutions in their sustainable finance efforts.
👉 Download this full Fintech for Sustainable Finance #fintechreport here.
👀 NEWS HIGHLIGHT
Sam Bankman-Fried’s defense: ‘I did not try to commit fraud.’
The cryptocurrency billionaire whose empire collapsed spectacularly this month and spawned at least two federal investigations, sat for a wide-ranging interview at The New York Times’s DealBook Summit, saying he “screwed up.”
👉 Check the full interview video here.
😎 SPONSORED CONTENT
Contis helps organisations unleash their true potential with award-winning, cloud-based Banking-as-a-Service solutions. With Contis you can put next-generation cards, accounts and apps in your customer’s hands.
📰 ARTICLE
Klarna eyes profitability in 2023 despite losses doubling.
“Klarna has made huge progress on our path to profitability, which we expect to hit on a monthly basis in the second half of 2023,” cofounder and CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski said in a statement accompanying the results.
The company reduced its operating losses by $169m (42%) between Q2 and Q3 this year, which it attributed to the 10% cut to its global workforce it made in May. Klarna then made a second round of layoffs just outside the quarter, in late September.
👉 Read the full Sifted article by Amy O'Brien here.
📰 ARTICLE
In her a16z Summit talk, Angela Strange shared her belief of how “every company will be a FinTech company” in the not-too-distant future. Starbucks has been masquerading as a FinTech company for a while now.
👉 Read this amazing WhiteSight article by Kshitija Kaur and Risav Chakraborty for the full story here.
💬 INTERVIEW
"You have to focus everyone on one thing" - An interview with Curve CEO Shachar Bialick.
The founder says his company is focused 100 percent on forging a path towards profitability but thinks 2023 could be the year when many other fintech firms finally close-up shop.
👉 Read the full Altfi interview article by Will McCurdy here.
🧐 ANALYSIS
2022 has witnessed a blizzard of tech layoffs, and the FinTech industry was no exception.
The reasons for layoffs cited varied, ranging from macroeconomic conditions to industry shifts to company-level factors.
👉 Read this very interesting full WhiteSight article by Risav Chakraborty & Anjali Singh here.
💡INSIGHTS
Below you can find the FinTech Industry insights from the Nordics🇫🇮🇩🇰🇳🇴🇮🇸🇸🇪 by Helsinki Fintech Farm, including funding rounds, partnerships, acquisitions, and new launches 👇
👉 Read the full Helsinki Fintech article here.
NOW, ON TO THE SUMMARY OF LAST WEEK'S NEWS
🌎 FINTECH HIGHLIGHTS
⭐️ BUX acquired the retail arm of its Spanish rival Ninety Nine. Link here.
⭐️ Adyen empowers the accounting platform Moneybird to offer financial services. Link here.
⭐️ Curve defies the market and secures a $1 billion deal from Credit Suisse. Link here.
⭐️ Osome snared $25m investment from Asian, European and US investors. Link here.
⭐️ Shield raised $20 million in a Series B round of funding. Link here.
PAYMENTS
HELPFUL partnered with Mastercard in a ‘transformative’ deal for creator and music platforms and how they handle payments. Link here.
Finaro announced its partnership with Ginger Payments, under which Finaro will empower the Ginger Payments platform with its pioneering suite of acquiring and transaction routing capabilities. Link here.
MasterCard to support Azerbaijani fintech companies. Link here.
BNPL
Bumper raised £26.1 million in funding from its Series A extension round, highlighted by the backing of Jaguar Land Rover’s investment arm. Link here.
Klarna's valuation dropped from $45.6 billion to $6.7 billion in 2022. Its CEO wants a 'sane market' before IPO. Link here.
DIGITAL BANKING
Cashplus Bank launched next-generation credit card functionality for small businesses and sole traders. Link here.
CRYPTO
Nexo secured registration as a Virtual Currency Operator with Italy’s Organismo Agenti e Mediatori. Link here.
Plum is adding crypto investing to its range of investment options in France, Belgium, Spain and Ireland, via services provided by Bitpanda. Link here.
Unbanked launches crypto card program in Europe. Link here.
BLOCKCHAIN / DEFI
JP Morgan is in discussions about a takeover of Freetrade, a British stock trading app that targeted a £700m valuation during talks with investors earlier this year. Link here.
INVESTMENT
MarketFinance is rebranding as Kriya. The new name comes from a Sanskrit word “denoting a state of flow and completed action”. Link here.
Paynt launched Paynt Funding – a fully embedded cash advance solution that allows merchants of any size to access extra funds in no time. Link here.
GREEN FINANCE
Treecard raised £19.2 million in Series A funding. Link here.
MOVERS & SHAKERS
Tuum announced the appointment of Giorgio Daher as UK Sales Director. Link here.