JPMorgan goes all-in into Bitcoin 😲; Stripe, but for B2B payments 👀; Nubank is a VC 💸

Good Morning FinTech. 17/30

The Curious Case of Jaime Dimon

Good morning Everyone,

And happy Friday! Hope your week has been going great. Sadly, it’s about to end… Here’s a mix of 3 great stories to finish the week on a positive note:

JPMorgan goes all-in into Bitcoin 😲

The pitch 🥊 Banking giant JPMorgan Chase began pitching an in-house Bitcoin fund to its Private Bank clients for the first time this week. This is somewhat a transformation from the “never-bitcoin” mega-bank to a participant in the digital assets market 🤷‍♂️

The fund 💸 The passively managed fund doesn’t have any investments from clients yet, according to two people familiar with the matter as per CoinDesk. The fund is being offered in partnership with NYDIG, which is the Bitcoin arm of asset-management firm Stone Ridge.

The USP 😲 The fund, which CoinDesk revealed in late April, will be presented to clients as the safest and cheapest Bitcoin investment vehicle available on private markets, the sources said. 

✈️ THE TAKEAWAY

The transformation 👀 This move by one of the biggest banks in the world is probably the most famous transformation - from traditional-only to digital-assets first approach - in the history of banking. “I am not a bitcoin supporter, I don’t really care about bitcoin,” Dimon, the CEO of JPM, told the Wall Street Journal in May. “On the other hand, clients are interested and I don’t tell clients what to do.” As always, one has gotta follow the money 🤑

Stripe, but for B2B payments 👀

The money 💸 Reserve Trust, a Denver-based financial services upstart, has raised $30.5M in a Series A round led by QED Investors.

FinTech Collective, Ardent Venture Partners, Flywire CEO Mike Massaro, and Quovo founder and CEO Lowell Putnam also participated in the financing. It brings the startup’s total raised since its 2016 inception to $35.5M.

Stripe for B2B 🤑 Reserve Trust describes itself as “the first FinTech trust company with a Federal Reserve master account.” Simply speaking, a federal reserve master account allows Reserve Trust to move dollars on behalf of its customers directly, via wire and ACH payment rails, without an intermediate or partner bank. Hence, one can think of it like Stripe for B2B payments.

✈️ THE TAKEAWAY

A massive opportunity 💸 Historically, only banks were able to access these payment rails directly, which left both domestic and international FinTechs with very few partner options, not to mention poor technology, and slow implementations when it came to embedding high-value B2B payments. This is a big and untapped market as B2B payments is much bigger in terms of volume compared to consumer payments. It is being estimated that B2B payments is at least $20 trillion of the addressable payment flow. Stripe, the consumer-side giant, is worth close to $100B. Think about that for a sec when putting Reserve Trust in this perspective.

Nubank is a VC 💸

What’s the deal? 🤔 Jupiter, an Indian neobank, has raised $45M in a new financing round as the startup gears up for its platform’s public launch. The new financing round, a Series B, was co-led by Nubank (the biggest challenger bank in the world by customer count), Global Founders Capital, Sequoia Capital, and Matrix Partners India.

Mirae Assets Venture also joined the round and existing investors including Addition Ventures, Tanglin VC, 3one4 Capital, Greyhound, and Beenext also participated.

Valuation 📈 The new round values the India-based startup, which has raised $70M to date, at over $300M.

Obviously, a BNPL play… 😬 The platform, which positions itself as a ‘100% digital bank’, offers the ability to Buy Now, Pay Later on UPI, a standard developed by a coalition of banks in India.

✈️ THE TAKEAWAY

Jupiter is fine but this is about Nubank. Nubank is huge, and that’s one of its core strengths, especially in its home - LatAm markets. It looks like it is following the likes of Stripe (and some other players) and hence trying to diversify by putting some cash into promising startups (not necessarily FinTech-related). This year alone, it has already made 4 investments - to software company TeamHub, CX startup Online OS, EdTech startup Parças Developers School, and now Jupiter. Having the backing of Warren Buffett himself, Nubank is definitely here to stay, and it might be only getting started…

🔎 What else I’m watching

• New guidelines🇳🇬 The apex regulator of banking activities in Nigeria has released new guidelines to further regulate the services provided by mobile money operators (MMOs) in Nigeria. The new guidelines released on 9 July 2021 have made some additions to the 2015 framework. They provide coverage of the MMO value chain from service providers to subscribers and agents. 

• London upgrade🇬🇧 Ethereum’s latest hard fork upgrade dubbed “London” was officially activated. This backward-incompatible hard fork also marked the rollout of five new Ethereum Improvement Proposals which aim to improve the Ethereum network’s user experience, value proposition, and more.

• Bitcoin tracking from France🇫🇷 French asset manager Melanion Capital won regulatory approval to launch an ETF tracking the price of bitcoin for investors across the European Union. The fund will track a basket of up to 30 stocks with a 90% correlation to bitcoin’s price, according to a statement.

💸 Following the Money

• The technology services firm Pico is set to go public following a $1.75B merger with a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC). Pico and FTAC Athena Acquisition Group could provide $450 million in proceeds. The deal — which is backed by a $200 million private investment in public equity — is expected to close late this year, with Pico trading on the Nasdaq.

• Dubai-based buy now, pay later (BNPL) provider tabby has raised $50M in a new equity round, pushing its valuation to $300M.

• Silicon Valley finance concierge startup Zeni raised $34M in a Series B funding round led by Elevation Capital with additional participation from new backers, Think Investments, and Neeraj Arora.

• Crypto exchange operator Coinbase has agreed to acquire Zabo — a crypto data aggregator that enables FinTechs and financial services firms to connect with crypto exchanges, wallets, and protocols.

👋 That’s it for today! Thank you for reading and have a productive Friday! And if you enjoyed this newsletter, invite your friends and colleagues to sign up:

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