Hello TWIF UK & Europe friends,

Please find another week of fintech news, financings and exits below.

👍 👎 Have feedback or news to share? Let me know on Twitter and LinkedIn.

Funding 💸

Highlights below of deals since the last post in the fintech space across the UK & Europe. Deal data powered by Dealroom.

🇪🇺 Crypto payments startup Brighty raised a $10m round from Futurecraft Ventures.

🇪🇺 Nordic spend management solution Mynt raised a €22m Series B.

🇪🇺 Wealthtech Upvest raised a €100m Series C led by Hedosphia.

🇪🇺 Co-investment platform NAO raised a €3.4m round from Zeitgeist X Ventures.

🇬🇧 Regtech Themis raised a £7.3m round.

🇬🇧 B2B car lender Ayan Capital raised a £2.8m round fro Cur8 Capital.

Challenger Banking 🚀

🇪🇺 Danish neobank Lunar is to offer its underlying technology as a separate BaaS business.

🇪🇺 Scalable Capital has launched a unified investment platform and EU stock exchange for private investors.

🇪🇺 N26 adds ready-made funds to its investment offerings.

🇬🇧 Neobank Revolut has applied to get a banking licence in New Zealand. It also launched the availability of its app in Ukrainian language and launched joint accounts in Singapore.

🇬🇧 Neobank Monzo is expanding into Europe and hiring for roles in its EU hub.

🇬🇧 Lender Salad Finance registered as an AISP with the FCA.

🇬🇧 O2 Telefonica has launched automatic travel insurance.

Digital Assets ₿

🇪🇺 Deutsche Bank signed up as Crypto.com's corporate banking partner in APAC.

🇪🇺 Crypto infrastructure provider Boerse Stuttgart Digital partnered with ETP market maker Flow Traders to enhance institutional crypto trading.

🌍 Crypto exchange Crypto.com acquired Abu Dhabi brokerage firm Orion Principals.

🌍 Goldman Sachs would consider bitcoin and ether trading if regulations shift in US.

🌍 Tether is recognised as an accepted virtual asset in Abu Dhabi.

🌍 Amazon's shareholders are urging the company to allocate 5% of its reserves to Bitcoin, mirroring the moves of MicroStrategy.

🌍 Circle has partnered with Binance to expand the adoption of USDC.

🌍 Ripple has secured NYDFS approval for its RLUSD stablecoin.

🌍 Standard Chartered is to provide cash management, trading and custody services for Paxos.

Traditional Banking 🏦

🇪🇺Santander has partnered with payroll provider CloudPay to provide earned wage access to the banks SME clients in Spain.

🇪🇺 ABN Amro is testing a "Pay Later" feature for B2B transactions.

🇬🇧 Open banking platform Plaid signed SME lender Capitalise as a customer to use open banking data to pre-approve funding.

Fintech Infrastructure 🚧

🇪🇺 Payments infrastructure provider Banking Circle is looking for new buyers with the help of EQT and FT Partners.

🇪🇺 Open banking platform Neonomics is to provide open banking payments to investment platform Kameo.

🇪🇺 Payment provider Worldline is expanding to UAE with a partnership with Dubai-based gateway aggregator Telr.

🇪🇺 EBA Clearing has launched a Sepa wide Verification of Payee service.

🇬🇧 Open banking platform TrueLayer is providing its Pay by Bank solution to Ryanair.

🇬🇧Embedded finance solution Railsr is to acquire Equals Money for £283m.

🌍 Middesk has launched Address Risk insight, a tool to assess risk associated with business addresses during onboarding.

🌍 Issuer processor Lithic has launched a revolving credit API to provide revolving commercial credit to clients.

🌍 Issuer processor Marqeta is powering Slope's new BNPL card.

Payments 💰

🇪🇺 Domestic payment scheme Vipps MobilePay launched an alternative to Apple Pay on iPhone in Norway. Swedish payment app Swish also added payment cards to its Tap-to-Pay solution.

🇪🇺Apple is launching its Tap to Pay on iPhone in UAE with Adyen.

🇪🇺 Klarna was fined £35m by the Swedish regulator for breaking AML rules. It was also added as a payment option through Apple Pay in Canada.

🇬🇧 Payment technology provider Dojo has enabled its merchants to accept Amex cards.

🇬🇧 PSP SumUp has expanded its Cash Advance product to Europe.

🌍 PayPal is exploring higher pricing for its Braintree unit.

🌍 Payment processor Fiserv has cut 1,500 employees.

🌍 Digital bank MoneyLion has been acquired by Gen Digital for $1bn.

Regulatory Corner 🔎

🌍 The Qatar Central Bank has released a regulatory framework for digital banks.

🌍 Google has sued CFPB after it announced digital wallets such as Google Pay now fall under its purview.

Longer reads/listens 📜

• Networks, Value Assembly and Organizational Structures - Tom Noyes
• Stablecoins | The Monetary Upgrade - Peter Schroeder
• Wrapping up 2024 - Tom Noyes
• It’s Time to Require Better Ledgers - Dimitri Dadiomov, Modern Treasury

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See you next week!