👀 NEWS HIGHLIGHT
FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried asked a New York federal judge to dismiss most of the criminal case against him, saying the Justice Department brought flawed charges in a rush to indict him after the collapse of the crypto exchange.
📰 ARTICLE
PayPal beat its revenue growth target in the first quarter and raised its forecast for the year. But the changing focus of the company is still sending investors for a loop.
The payments company’s growth, which slowed after a surge during the early stages of the pandemic, is now being fueled by a couple standouts.
💬 INTERVIEW
⚫ Brex co-CEO on what the banking crisis means for startups and FinTech:
When the two most important banks serving technology startups, Silicon Valley Bank and First Republic, collapsed, it offered an opportunity for fintech firm Brex.
The company sprung into action to pick up where the big banks left off, and it’s become a popular place for earlier-stage startups to park their cash.
Read the full Semafor interview article with Brex co-founder and co-CEO Henrique Dubugras here.
⚫ PYMNTS recently posed questions to Gilles Gade, the CEO of FinTech-focused Cross River Bank.
The recent collapses of tech-friendly banks, including Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), Signature Bank, Silvergate Bank and First Republic Bank, have rightly caused a global conversation about the future of banking, and even more so, of financial services.
Here’s what the challenger bank chief Gilles Gade thinks about the contemporary environment and what needs to change.
💡INSIGHTS
⚫ Stuart Sopp, Current CEO, joins ‘Fast Money’ to discuss the regional banking crisis and what it means for the fintech space.
Current CEO Stuart Sopp says the ‘duration bubble’ is bursting for banks.
⚫ Opportunities for Banks in FinTech.
In this Flagship Advisory Partners report you can find more opportunities, stats, and figures.
🎤 PODCAST
Miguel Armaza sits down with David Haber, General Partner at Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), one of the largest Venture Capital funds in the world. David focuses exclusively on investing in global fintech.
NOW, ON TO THE SUMMARY OF LAST WEEK'S NEWS
🇺🇸 NATIONAL HIGHLIGHTS
⭐️Robinhood introduced a new instant access savings account on Apple paying an interest rate of 4.65 %.
⭐️Block generated a gross profit of $1.71 billion in Q1 2023, up 32% year over year.
⭐️TD Bank and First Horizon mutually agree to terminate the merger agreement.
⭐️ Stripe announced the launch of a Stripe-hosted fiat-to-crypto onramp, making it easier for Web3 companies to help US-based customers purchase crypto.
⭐️ JPMorgan was legally obligated to cover Javice’s legal bills, rejecting the bank’s argument that her alleged fraud fell outside the scope of the 2021 merger agreement.
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DIGITAL BANKING
MoneyLion announced financial results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2023.
Dave Inc.'s announced financial highlight for Q1 2023.
First Citizen BancShares Inc reported a gain of $9.82 billion in the first quarter from its acquisition of failed lender Silicon Valley Bank in March.
VC FUNDS
Charlie, a new startup offering banking services for the 62+ community, which launched with $7.5 million in funding. Better Tomorrow Ventures led the company’s funding round, which included participation from Expa, Gokul Rajaram and more.
Petal raised $35 million in new funding and has spun off its B2B-focused data infrastructure and analytics subsidiary, Prism Data. Valar Ventures led this new investment, joined by Story Ventures, Core Innovation Capital, and RiverPark Ventures, among others.
OpenEnvoy announced raising $15m in a Series A funding round. OpenEnvoy aims to prevent billions of dollars in overpayments by automating costly finance processes.
Moonsense raised $4.2 million in seed funding and the general availability of its user behavioral and network intelligence solution to help organizations future-proof their fraud detection and prevention.
Slash has come out of stealth mode with a total of $19 million in seed and Series A funding.
Inbox Health secured $22.5 million in a Series B funding round led by Ten Coves Capital. The round also saw participation from existing investors including Commerce Ventures, CT Innovations, Vertical Venture Partners and more.
PAYMENTS
Mastercard unveiled a digital account opening tool that uses open banking to integrate customer verification with identity insights into a single API.
Pidgin is among the first companies in the industry to complete testing and certification for the FedNowSM Service, the Federal Reserve’s new instant payment offering to launch in July 2023.
Paysend is targeting America's 60 million-strong Hispanic population after securing a partnership deal with Spanish-language content and media company, TelevisaUnivision.
Uber and Stripe sign an expanded global partnership to help Uber reduce payment costs while giving customers more ways to pay.
Mozrt partnered with Standard Chartered to enable banks, credit unions, and FinTechs to access Standard Chartered’s expertise and payments capabilities in emerging markets from within Mozrt’s payments platform.
Capital One returns fire at Walmart as credit card deal sours. In a new court filing, Capital One also accuses Walmart of trying to abandon a long-term deal the two companies struck back in 2018
OPEN BANKING
Taktile partners with Codat, CRS, and others to provide easy access to traditional credit, identity, fraud, open banking, accounting and alternative data.
CRYPTO
Gemini is launching a non-U.S. derivatives platform to serve 30 countries and territories, including Singapore, Hong Kong, Brazil, and the Philippines.
Ripple and Coinbase, flocked to the UAE this week both bringing with them the commercial draw of potentially relocating their operations to the Middle Eastern business hub.
PayPal disclosed nearly $1 billion in cryptocurrencies on its balance sheet in a 10-Q filing with the SEC.
SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
Peach Finance announced its international expansion with a launch in Canada.
Brex's customers can now issue cards and locally fund reimbursements in over 20 currencies across 45 countries.
Rapid Finance and Mambu integrate loan origination and management solutions.
MOVERS & SHAKERS
Peter Ackerson departed from his role as a general partner at fintech-focused venture firm Fin Capital and started a new firm, Audere Capital.
Sionic appointed Susan Currey as chief compliance officer (CCO).
If you are a fintech startup and have over 100 questions send me an email, maybe I can answer a few.