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The Front Page of Global Fintech

The the largest fintech community in the world. Subscribe to our newsletter to stay up to date on the latest in news opinions, and all things financial technology.

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SplitIt splits with ASX in favor of a $50 million go-private deal (TWIF 8/20)

SplitIt splits with ASX in favor of a $50 million go-private deal (TWIF 8/20)
Surfing Byron Bay

Hello Fintech Friends,

We were excited to see that The Fintech Fund’s portfolio company Vault* was ranked the #1 best business bank account in Canada this week! If you operate a Canadian business and want an easy multicurrency-native banking option, check out Vault.

Please find another week of fintech exits and deep reads below. (👍👎 Have feedback for us? Let us know!)


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📖 Read of the Week

This week, Cowboy Ventures’ Jillian Williams writes about the ongoing challenge of mitigating fraud risk in a digital-first, real-time-payments world, and the universe of companies built to help financial institutions combat fraud. (Including portfolio co’s TrueBiz*, Themis*, and Hummingbird*.)

While over at The Generalist, Plaid got the sponsored writeup treatment from Mario Gabriele in Plaid: Finance's Next Great Network. It’s worth a read on the aggregator’s shifting strategy, shedding its screen-scraping roots and building a permissioned, authenticated financial data and payments network.

I also found these two spreadsheets helpful this week (disclosure: I do not maintain them and cannot vouch for their accuracy):


☯️ Exits
🤝 M&A - Fintech
  • Australian listed buy-now-pay-later provider SplitIt, dealing with a market slump in BNPL and lending interest, agreed to delist from the Australian Stock Exchange with $50 million capital injection from Motive Partners, $25 million of which becomes available when it delists from the ASX and re-lists as a Cayman Islands company, the second $25 million of which is conditional on hitting undisclosed revenue targets. SplitIt is headquartered in Atlanta.
  • Relatedly, Turkish payments and cashback provider Param agreed to acquire Czech buy-now-pay-later provider Twisto in order to obtain its licenses and expand into the European market.
  • The FTC dropped their antitrust lawsuit against InterContinental Exchange, the parent of the New York Stock Exchange, which proposed to merge with mortgage software provider Black Knight for $13.1 billion.
  • Uruguayan payments provider DLocal was exploring a sale following activist pressure… that is, before a new exec appointment sent share prices soaring up.
  • Alternative investment platform Yieldstreet is nearing a deal to acquire real estate investment platform Cadre, once valued at $800 million, for around $100 million. 
  • AP automation and invoice processing firm Basware made a £17.8 million cash offer for Irish accounts payable automation and analytics provider Glantus.
  • Brazilian payments provider Matera acquired artificial intelligence-powered customer retention firm Cinnecta.

🏦 M&A - Bank and FinServ
  • Mastercard agreed to purchase a minority stake in the fintech division of MTN Group, Africa’s largest telco, for $5.2 billion.
  • Apollo and Sixth Street are emerging as the early bidders for Goldman Sachs' spinout of its distressed Greensky lending business.

Private equity firm TPG approached accounting firm EY about buying a stake in their consulting arm.


🌎 Fintech Around the World

Fintech in Uzbekistan

Singapore fintech firms eye bigger share of bank-dominated payment services

9 Fintech Firms from Southeast Asia Make CNBC’s 2023 Top 200 Fintech Leaderboard

4 FinTech mobile apps facilitating digital banking services in Middle East

The Future of Fintech in the Middle East 2023

Revolut prioritizes financial inclusion in expansion into LATAM

Ebanx: Why is a Brazilian fintech unicorn expanding to Africa?

📚 Deeper Reads & Features

The Iron Triangle of Embedded Fintech

Fintech is a mess. Is BaaS the outlier?

The Enduring Value of Funding-Driven Fintech

Inside Chipper Cash’s Grueling Battle To Survive The Fintech Winter

How AI Is Increasing Fraud Risks Across The Fintech Industry

Banks race to restate uninsured deposit totals after FDIC guidance

As CFPB Rulemaking Proceeds, Trustly Regulatory Chief Says Open Banking Primed to ‘Empower’ Consumers

Generative AI: A Big Bang Moment For FinTech

How the US financial sector is embracing digital transformation in payments

An Inside Look at Starbucks' Web3 Journey

Top 10 Web3 Technology That Are Shaping The Future Of Online Payment

Why Owner Is 'Aspiring To Have a Love' Like Golden Retriever and His Toys


Have a news item for us? Reach out to news@thisweekinfintech.com