New unicorn in payments 🦄; Square of Africa 💳; Klarna is buying. Again 💸
Good Morning FinTech. 10/30
Good morning Everyone,
And happy Wednesday! Hope your week has been going great. If not, it will be after these 3 FinTech stories for today:
New unicorn in payments 🦄
Singapore shines🇸🇬 Nium, a global payments processor headquartered in Singapore, raised a $200M Series D round led by Riverwood Capital that values the company at more than $1B.
Regulations-first 🏦 Nium has 11 bank licenses in seven countries across Asia Pacific, as well as licenses in the US, Canada, the UK, and Europe. It can process payments to more than 100 countries, with 61 of them in real-time. It is now in the process of expanding from Asia and Europe to the US and is next setting its sights on Latin America.
Steady growth 📈 The company claims $8B in payments processed annually, and its revenue has grown 280% year-over-year. Nium has 5 core customer segments: banking, fintech companies, distributed workforces around the gig economy and supply chain contractors, travel, and finally corporate customers.
✈️ THE TAKEAWAY
Payments are still hot🔥 Payments is still a very hot vertical in FinTech. Given that the global B2B payments market is reportedly valued at $120 trillion annually, it is not surprising there’s such a massive interest from both VCs and startups. It’s definitely not the winner-takes-all game - rather it’s about the brand awareness and biggest value add to your customers. Nium’s approach to providing access to a global payment infrastructure (including card issuance, accounts receivable and payable, and banking-as-a-service) through a single API is a strong seller.
Square of Africa 💳
Yoco. South Africa-based FinTech Yoco has announced receiving $83M in Series C funding to scale offline and online offerings and expand to new markets.
What is it? Founded in 2013, Yoco started off offering a point of sale card reader that links to its proprietary payment and performance software. Since then it has positioned itself as the go-to platform to access offline payments among merchants in the country. I would think of them as the Square of Africa…
The problem 💭 Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) contribute heavily to the economic success of many countries, particularly those in the developing world. They are the backbone of most economies: globally, SMEs represent about 90% of existing businesses and create more than 50% of employment.
In South Africa, these businesses contribute around one-third of the country’s GDP. Despite South Africa’s high card and mobile penetration rates of over 70%, the country’s SMEs still struggle to accept cards.
✈️ THE TAKEAWAY
When the problem is clear… South Africa has over 6 million small businesses that still transact only in cash, hence, this provides a huge opportunity for Yoco. If we would look at the whole African continent, the numbers should be much much bigger. Therefore, if Yoco can continue its success across SA as well as replicate it across the continent, it will undoubtedly become the Square of Africa. Acquisitions might come next… 👀
Klarna is buying. Again 💸
Commerce-first 🔎 Payments giant Klarna announced plans to acquire another social commerce company. The move is aimed at helping it round out its retail services and meet rising consumer demand for better interactive shopping experiences.
Newest member 👥 APPRL is the newest member of the Klarna family, which is an end-to-end influencer marketing software meant to help eCommerce brands connect with content creators in order to meet consumers where they are. The terms of the deal were not disclosed.
✈️ THE TAKEAWAY
Klarna wants to be at the center of all things commerce. Positioning itself as both a payments and shopping platform, Klarna has a huge advantage over other BNPL players as well as alternative payments providers. It’s clear that Klarna has been heavily focused lately on the shopping experiences. One can remember that very recently Klarna has acquired social shopping startup HERO that will be leveraged to give retailers the ability to create shoppable content from brick-and-mortar locations. Put it all together, and Klarna is clearly emerging as an e-commerce giant.
🔎 What else I’m watching
Goldman ETF 👀 Goldman Sachs has applied for DeFi ETF, joining over a dozen crypto ETF applications sitting before the SEC.
False rumors 🙅🏽♂️ Amazon has denied a rumor it was planning to accept bitcoin payments by the end of the year, following an erroneous City A.M. report earlier Monday that cited a single, unnamed “insider.”
SWIFT goes 🚀 Seven major global banks are live on SWIFT Go, a new service by the global interbank messaging system aiming to offer low-cost, cross-border payments. BBVA, NBY Mellon, DNB, MYBank, Sberbank, Societe Generale, and UniCredit are the seven banks using SWIFT Go, according to an announcement Tuesday.
💸 Following the Money
Argentinian crypto exchange Lemon raises $16M to expand in Latin America The company plans to expand its operations n Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Uruguay by the end of 2022.
Sila, an API platform that provides payment infrastructure as a service while ensuring regulatory compliance, has secured $13M in Series A funding led by Revolution Ventures.
Australia-based mobile app Spriggy has raised $35M from NAB Ventures, Grok Ventures, and Perennial Value Management. Spriggy is a mobile app fitted out with a prepaid card for digital ‘pocket money’ that aims to help children learn the concepts of digital money and financial responsibility.
The popular NFT game Splinterlands has raised $3.6M from Animoca Brands and others.
Fireblocks, which provides custody and other digital assets-related services for the institutional crowd, has raised $310M in a Series D funding round.
Solana-based stablecoin exchange Saber has raised $7.7M from Chamath Palihapitiya's Social Capital, Jump Capital, and others.
👋 That’s it for today! Thank you for reading and have a productive Wednesday! And if you enjoyed this newsletter, invite your friends and colleagues to sign up:
P.S. This is a free issue 10/30. You can subscribe now for $7/month or $70/year, or join later. I must note though that after the first 30 issues, the price will be $17,90/month or $179/year (the price for current subscribers won’t change). It’s still a bargain as you will save at least 180 minutes. Every week.