This Week in Fintech (1/22)

Hello Fintech Friends,

We had a great first happy hour of 2022 in Mexico City last night! Thank you to LatAm Editor Christine Chang for organizing – we’ll be taking off across Latin America with our events this year.

Also, for all you policy wonks out there, be sure you don’t miss Ben White’s new Policy edition of the weekly newsletter 👀

Please find another week of fintech financings and exits below.

Editor’s Note: If you’re an early-stage startup founder raising equity or debt, we may be able to help - please see our primer for more details and reach out to nik@thisweekinfintech.com.

PItch Deck of the Week: This week, Gen, a digital financial services provider to Africans, is kicking off its $2 million pre-seed round. Reach out for introductions.

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💼 Open Role Spotlight

Come find your place on the team at the most inspiring fintech startups! Browse open roles on This Week in Fintech’s job board.

💸 Venture Financing

iTrustCapital, which facilitates crypto inclusion in retirement accounts, raised a $125 million Series A.
Rain, a Bahrain-based digital currency brokerage, raised $110 million in Series B funding.
Spendesk, a French corporate spend management tool, raised a €100m Series C at over €1 billion.
Facet Wealth, a financial advice platform, raised a $100 million Series C.
Personetics, a core banking financial advice platform for legacy banks, raised $85 million.
Lummo, an Indonesian bookkeeping app for small businesses formerly known as BukuKas, raised an $80 million Series C.
Moss, a German small business payment and corporate card startup, raised a €75 million Series B.
INDmoney, an Indian wealth management ML tool, raised a $75 million Series D.
SoSafe, a cybersecurity platform for financial services, raised a $73 million in Series B.
Canalyst, a financial data and analytics firm, raised a $70 million Series C.
M2P Fintech, an Indian financial infrastructure provider, raised $56 million at a $600 million valuation.
Pinwheel, a payroll API provider, raised a $50 million Series B at a $500 million valuation.
Arya, which provides a credit marketplace for Indian farmers, raised a $46 million Series C.
Shakepay, a bitcoin-as-a-service provider for financial apps, raised a C$44 million round.
BlockFills, a digital asset trading provider for fintechs, raised a $37 million Series A.
Cushon, a UK workplace savings platform, raised £35 million.
Lean Technologies, a Saudi bank data and payment initiation platform, raised a $33 million Series A.
Juro, a contract automator for financial services institutions, raised $23 million in Series B funding.
Doconomy, a climate investing data platform, raised $19 million.
Fairplay, a Mexican revenue-based financing startup, raised $15 million in equity and $20 million in debt.
LipaLater, a buy-now-pay-later provider for Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda, and Nigeria, raised $12 million.
BillEase, a Philippines buy-now-pay-later provider, raised an $11 million Series B.
Routefusion, a cross-border payments provider, raised a $10.5 million “seed prime” round.
Payflow, a Spanish earned wage access startup, raised a $9.1 million Series A.
Burnt Finance, a decentralized NFT auction protocol, raised an $8 million Series A.
Float, a Ghanaian credit line originator for small businesses, raised $7 million in seed funding and $10 million in debt.
Vartana, a B2B buy-now-pay-later provider, raised $7 million in equity and $50 million in credit.
WealthKernel, a digital investing advisor, raised $7 million to expand into Europe.
Soma.Finance, a decentralized asset exchange, raised a $6.5 million seed round.
Orda, a point of sale payments system for African restaurants, raised a $1.1 million pre-seed.
Asaak, a Ugandan asset financing startup, raised $30 million in combined equity and debt.
CFM, a software provider to retail banks, raised strategic funding from OceanSound Partners.
Capital Markets Gateway, an equity markets software, raised strategic funding from Bank of America and Credit Suisse.

💵 Debt Financing

Atempo Growth launched a $200 million debt fund for European tech companies, funded primarily by Santander Bank.

☯️ Exits

💻 IPOs & SPACs

Acorns is abandoning its planned $2.2 billion SPAC merger with Pioneer Merger Corp. Acorns will receive a $17.5m termination fee and plans to raise venture.
RIA service Dynasty Financial Partners filed for IPO.

🤝 M&A - Fintech

Telco Singapore Telecommunications and superapp Grab each bought 16.3% of Indonesian bank PT Bank Fama International.
Plaid acquired identity verification and KYC / AML platform Cognito.
Brazilian bank Itaú Unibanco fully acquired cloud-based brokerage firm Ideal for R$651 million (US$117 million).
Digital currency exchange Gemini acquired trading tech platform Omniex.
Telecommunications firm Telenor Group will sell its 51% stake in Myanmar’s Wave Money for $53 million to Yoma MFS Holdings.
Treasury and risk management provider GTreasury acquired accounting software Hedge Trackers.
Australian bank NAB will acquire digital health payments firm LanternPay.
NFT marketplace Opensea announced that it will acquire defi platform Dharma Labs.
Wealth management software developer New Republic Partners received an investment from SkyKnight Capital.
Private equity firm IK Partners is acquiring fund admin FCG.
KKR acquired real estate lending platform Merchants Mortgage Trust.
China Cinda Asset Management abandoned plans to buy a 20% stake in Ant Group’s finance arm for $1 billion, under pressure from Chinese regulators.

🏦 M&A - Bank and FinServ

Financial services platform B. Riley Financial will acquire investment bank FocalPoint Securities for $175 million.
Private equity firms KKR and Prudential are bidding for bank BNY Mellon’s credit arm, Alcentra.

(Source: Dr. Efi Pylanirou)

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