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💫 News Highlight: Jar raised $32 million in its Series A financing round, just months after securing its seed funding.

⚡ Just in Thought Machine has signed its second community bank in the US, Mascoma Bank.

⭐ Also, Robinhood’s losses widened substantially in Q4 as tumbling average user spend hurt trading.

👉🏻 Furthermore, Monument is increasing its headline rate to a huge 2.2 percent. That’s on its 5-year Fixed Term account, up from the 2.05 percent it previously offered, with no changes to its other accounts.

🪙 Crypto - Bakkt Holdings announced that Hanover Community Bank will join its early adopter program to connect to Bakkt’s cryptocurrency platform.

🚢 Partnerships - Cross River Bank is joining forces with fintech PayTile to deliver a peer-to-peer payments app that uses geo-location technology.

💰 Funding rounds & investments:

-Tribal Credit has raised $60 million in a Series B funding round led by SoftBank Group Corp. Latin America Fund, with participation from Coinbase Ventures.

-R2 announced on Thursday that it has raised a $5.9 million Seed round led by General Catalyst.

-Billhop AB announced it has raised €10.5 million, led by EQT Ventures with participation from Element Ventures.

-Founders Fund has led new investment in Ramp, at an $8 billion valuation, including the investment.

🪂 New Launches & Features:

Consumers will now be able to easily find sustainable options to shop in the Klarna app.

Paysend is expanding its peer-to-peer money transfer services globally.

Upgrade, Inc., has added a new feature: Shopping.

Sberbank has rolled out a service that lets customers send money to Alipay wallets in China using phone numbers.

Novo launched the Novo Virtual Card to provide small businesses with a fast, safe payment method that’s available from the moment they fund their Novo account.

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💫 News Highlight: PayPal CFO John Rainey disclosed that 4.5 million accounts had been shut down after “bad actors” took advantage of incentives and rewards programs, resulting in shares falling by 25%.

⚡ Just in Sokin is the latest UK fintech to embark on a mission to corner the US market.

⭐ Also, Masthaven Bank is withdrawing from the UK banking market.

👉🏻 Furthermore, Americans can now download the Monzo app and set up an account within 10 minutes, getting access to money management features and a contactless debit card.

🪙 Crypto - Bahrain-headquartered CoinMENAobtained a second cryptocurrency license from the European Union

🤝 M&As: Walmart has upped the ante on its SuperApp ambitions, with the recent acquisitions of two FinTechs –Ever Responsible Finance and One Finance

🚢 Partnerships -

💰 Funding rounds & investments:

🪂 New Launches & Features:

😎 Movers & Shakers: Kueski announced the appointment of Krishna Venkatraman as the company's chief data officer.

💼 Opportunities: Monzo Bank will allow its employees to take three months’ paid leave as it joins a growing number of businesses that are overhauling their working practices to become more flexible after the Covid-19 crisis.

💫 News Highlight: Mozper launched in Brazil, together with Visa. Mozper helps parents in Latin America educate their children to make smart and responsible financial decisions.

⚡ Just in Biller, an AI-driven BNPL company focused on business invoices, is set to join the Banking Circleecosystem of financial services and applications. Biller will operate as an independent sister company in the Banking Circle ecosystem

⭐ Also, Revolut will offer personal loans in Ireland. The company has grown its user base to 1.7 million and employs over 100 people there. Revolut says other lending products, such as credit cards, will follow later this year.

👉🏻 Furthermore, Revolut has moved into pet insurance in the UK. Revolut's Pet insurance will initially offer protection for cats and dogs. It will offer protection from vet costs and users will be offered round-the-clock free access to an online vet.

🪙 Crypto – DOGECOIN millionaire Glauber Contessoto said in a tweet that a Visa-based Dogecard will soon be unveiled.

🤝 M&As:

- DNA Payments Group is continuing its UK growth strategy by acquiring Kwalitas Ltd, a payment solutions provider based in Peterborough.

- Paysafe Group announced the completion of its SafetyPay acquisition.

🚢 Partnerships –

- Modulr announced a partnership with Ripple, the leader in enterprise blockchain and crypto solutions, to enable seamless payments into the UK and Europe.

- Atom bank is partnering with Sesame Bankhall Group to provide increased accessibility for those applying for mortgages through Sesame’s brokers.

💰 Funding rounds & investments:

- Rob Moffat, a partner at Balderton Capital, says fintech valuations are “going to be lower” and “late-stage fundraising is going to be harder” over the next few months amid market turmoil

- According to Dealroom.co data, last year Swiss fintech companies raised a total of US$530 million, up 129% from 2020.

- Instant has just taken claim to Australia’s largest ever pre-seed funding round, with a score of $2.2 million.

- Toronto-based KOHO has secured $210 million in a Series D financing round.

Berlin-based Circula picked up a 12 million euros in Series A funding.

- Tilo has raised 1.200 million euros in pre-seed funding led by European VC Peak Capital.

- Crypto venture firm Paradigm led a $109 million Series B investment in Phantom, CEO Brandon Millman said.

🪂 New Launches & Features:

- Simpler wants to bring "one-click checkout" payments to Europe, hoping to beat giant overseas rivals like Fast and Bolt to the mark.

- T-Mobile announced the True Name® by Mastercard® for T-Mobile MONEY debit card. Enabling all customers, including transgender and non-binary customers, to be their authentic self with their chosen name on their T-Mobile MONEY debit card.

This podcast episode is sponsored by Fintech Meetup. Fintech Meetup Is Almost Here! Only 30 Days Left To Get Your Ticket! The event will be Virtual, March 22nd to the 24th. Discounted startup rates are available for qualifying companies.

💫 News Highlight: Ryan Breslow, founder of Bolt, said he’s stepping down as chief executive officer, two weeks after securing an $11 billion valuation for the business. Breslow will become executive chairman, and Maju Kuruvilla, a 44-year-old Bolt executive and a former vice president at Amazon.com Inc., will be promoted to CEO. Breslow said in an interview that this was planned weeks ago before the latest financing was completed.

⚡ Just in Groupon shares are getting a huge lift from an apparently substantial appreciation of the company’s stake in the U.K.-based payments company SumUp.

⭐ Also, Subaio chose European open banking leader, Aiia, a Mastercard company, to enable a smarter way for assessing creditworthiness through Subaio’s new white-label offering.

👉🏻 Furthermore: MEDICI Global has identified PayPal, Square, Razorpay, Adyen, and Stripe as the largest payment gateways based on their Total Payment Volume.

🤝 M&As:

Block has completed its $29bn acquisition of ‘buy now, pay later firm Afterpay. Under the deal, first announced back in August 2021, Block - which is headed by the Twitter founder Jack Dorsey and owns the Square and Cash apps - has acquired all of the issued shares in Afterpay.

UniCredit will continue to study potential mergers and acquisitions after deciding against a Russian deal due to geopolitical risks but won’t stray from plans to return billions in capital to shareholders.

💰 Funding rounds & investments:

Pennylane raised $57 million (€50 million) in Series B funding. The round was led by existing investors Sequoia Capital, Global Founders Capital, and Partech.

Bamboo raised $15 million in a new financing round.

Dozens of tech executives, including the founders of Klarna, Skype, Delivery Hero, and Flutterwave, have launched a $ 200 million venture capital fund aimed at finding the next $ 1 billion or more in Africa

💼 Opportunities: Matt Cheung, a serial entrepreneur in the financial services sector, recommends recent graduates to broaden their job search. His advice is to not just look for graduate jobs in the big banks when a faster-growing and more exciting alternative is on offer.

This podcast episode is sponsored by Privacy Lock. Privacy Lock sets the standard for financial service providers in data privacy compliance.

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THE NEWS HIGHLIGHT OF THE DAY IS

Solarisbank AG and Contis Group Ltd have brought their previously formed partnership to completion. The firms have decided to enter into a definitive business combination agreement. Contis and Solarisbank will now operate as a joint entity, bringing an unrivaled Banking-as-a-Service offer to the European market.

JUST IN:

Monzo Bank failed to publish the MMC in its Fee Information document between 25 October 2018 - 19 November 2021. Monzo has taken steps to end the breach and prevent a recurrence.

ALSO:

Funding accelerated during 2021. Banking and lending tech raised a total of $40 billion across 1,061 deals, representing here around 30% of total FinTech funding, almost as much as the previous three years, combined.

WHAT ABOUT CRYPTO?

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (or SEC) approved the country's 17th stock exchange, a subsidiary of Boston-based BOX Exchange LLC, which will incorporate blockchain technology.

WHAT ABOUT FUNDING ROUNDS AND INVESTMENTS?

MyCointainer raised $6 million in a Seed Round. The event was led by Mapleblock Capital and co-led by Shima Capital & Bybit - one of the dominant cryptocurrency exchanges worldwide

Onramper raised $6 million in seed funding to accelerate the product roadmap and quadruple headcount over the next six months

OZÉ, a Ghanaian fintech startup that provides digital recordkeeping tools with embedded finance products, has raised a $3 million pre-Series A round

Kilde Financial Technologies closed a pre-Seed funding round of US$350,000 bringing its total funding to date to US$830,000.

NOW, LET’S COVER NEW LAUNCHES AND FEATURES.

Fintech start-up destream is launching a bank card for streamers and internet content creators.

AS FOR OPPORTUNITIES

Monzo Bank is to launch an investment and wealth business and is recruiting for an executive to head up the unit.

Worldline is to hire more than 5000 staff over the next few months to cement its position as a global paytech.

Welcome to the inaugural episode of our Daily Fintech Podcast.

This podcast episode is sponsored by Fintech Meetup. Fintech Meetup Is Almost Here! Only 30 Days Left To Get Your Ticket! The event will be Virtual, March 22nd to the 24th. Discounted startup rates are available for qualifying companies.

THE NEWS HIGHLIGHT OF THE DAY IS

Twitter was abuzz over a long thread written on Monday by Bolt CEO Ryan Breslow, who claimed that Stripe and Y Combinator are “mob bosses,” using “every power move imaginable” to block competitors from becoming successful.

JUST IN:

Solarisbank AG and Contis have completed their previously disclosed partnership, bringing their combined revenue to €100 million.

ALSO:

Revolut announced that U.S. customers can transfer money to Mexican bank accounts. The service will be offered free of a fee and would be done in up to 30 minutes.

FURTHERMORE,

Mastercard beat quarterly profit expectations on Thursday as domestic spending through its cards rose and cross-border volumes grew following an uptick in international travel.

Also on Thursday, Visa stated in an earnings call that its customers made $2.5 billion in payments using its crypto-linked cards during the first fiscal quarter of 2022.

Finally, during American Express’ Q4 2021 earnings call on Tuesday, CFO Jeffrey Campbell made clear that a crypto-linked card isn’t in the near future.

In order to provide you with easily digestible news updates, I will soon launch a daily FinTech News podcast! The first of its kind.

I’m always looking for new ways to inform my network. I think this podcast does the job of getting you up to speed on what’s going on in the FinTech space, at the start of your workday.

So, I would really appreciate it if you sign up here, so I can send you a notification once the first episode is live.