Which crypto companies do you think Goldman will buy? (TWIF 12/11)

Also: Galaxy Digital gets a self-custody platform and JG Wentworth gets into the fintech game.

Hello Fintech Friends,

As Day 1 of our UAE Fintech Trek kicks off, I’m wondering where should we take our treks next. Which fintech city would you most like to visit to meet the relevant leaders in the space?

Mexico City? London? Lagos? Drop me a note!

Also, a personal question: I have been using a 2017 Google Pixel 2 for the past 5 years and it’s (finally) slowing down and starting to crash. All I really care about are speed, storage, connectivity, and separating my work from personal profiles - all the other features are bells and whistles to me - what phone should I get next?

Please find another week of fintech exits and deep reads below.

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$11 billion of SPAC deals were called off within an hour this week, with the highest-profile deal canceled that of stablecoin issuer Circle’s impending $9 billion sale to Concord Acquisition Corp.

☯️ Exits

🤝 M&A - Fintech

JG Wentworth - yes, the firm behind all the ‘need cash now’ commercials - entered an agreement to acquire immigrant-focused lending fintech Stilt, which had previously raised over $36 million in equity. No mention was made of its accompanying banking-as-a-service business Onbo.
Distressed Asian cryptocurrency exchange Zipmex will sell itself to a venture capital firm, V Ventures, for a price of $100 million paid in a combination of digital tokens and cash.
Filipino digital bank Tonik entered an agreement to acquire employee financial wellness platform TendoPay.
Dutch neobroker BUX grew in Spain via the acquisition of the retail brokerage arm of B2B embedded finance platform Ninety Nine.
Roboadvisor Blooom sold itself to Morgan Stanley.
Commerce enablement software NMI announced its acquisition of payment solutions provider Agreement Express.
Crypto financial services provider Galaxy Digital won an auction to acquire the self-custody platform GK8 from collapsed crypto lender Celsius.
B2B payments and invoicing solutions provider TreviPay entered an agreement to acquire enterprise payment solution provider Apruve.
UK digital wealth manager Moneyfarm will buy pension adviser and consolidator with £870 million Profile Pensions.
Financial training provider CeriFi announced its acquisitions of professional training providers Checkpoint Learning and West LegalEdcenter from Thomson Reuters.

🏦 M&A - Bank and FinServ

Goldman Sachs plans to ramp up its own acquisition activity in the distressed crypto market, following the fallout from FTX’s collapse.
Mohammed bin Salman could invest $500 million to back CS First Boston’s acquisition of Credit Suisse’s investment bank, which is being spun out from the main bank.
Meanwhile, Mexican conglomerate Grupo Mexico is in advanced talks to acquire Citigroup’s Banamex retail banking unit.
French bank Credit Agricole sold off a 63.7% stake of its equity holdings of Moroccan bank Credit du Maroc to conglomerate Holmarcom.
Deutsche Bank’s asset management arm DWS is considering a sale of its private equity secondaries business.
It emerged that InterContinental Exchange made an attempted acquisition of the London Metals Exchange after chaos in its nickel commodities market forced it to freeze trading earlier this year.
Investcorp, a Bahrain-based alternative investing firm, entered the US with its acquisitions of Marble Point Credit Management, a US-based credit-focused asset manager with $7.8 billion AUM, and business advisory firm CrossCountry Consulting.
ACA Group, a governance, risk, and compliance consultancy focusing on financial services clients, acquired Advanced Regulatory Compliance, a compliance consultancy serving registered investment advisors.