Tearsheet's top financial services and fintech stories this week
Last month we wrapped up Acquire Conference 2022 – our guide recaps what the top fintech and financial services firms are doing to grow their businesses.
Download the 2022 Guide to Financial Marketing, Branding, and User Acquisition here to read about what’s next for branding and marketing from the industry’s decision-makers.
Our top stories this week
Unlocking the value in consumer data: Klover CEO Brian Mandelbaum on making banking freeKlover leverages user data to offer free financial services to its customers. Instead of relying on user fees, the firm drives revenue from its partner merchants.
Data snack: Square ends 2021 as the top SMB digital lender by volumeSquare Loans closed 2021 at record small business loan origination levels - $2.5 billion - higher than its pre-pandemic volumes.
The fintech also inched ahead of rivals PayPal and OnDeck for the first time, making it a market leader in the digital SMB lending space.
Read more (exclusive to Outlier members)
Marketing Briefing: How a fintech focused on creators goes about creating a standout imageFintechs continue to explore new ways of showing they're part of their consumers' lives. Meanwhile, with the Advertising Standards Authority taking notice, UK crypto firms need to start heeding guidelines.
Read more (exclusive to Outlier members)
How JPMorgan Chase’s recent C-suite changes enable more, new, and quicker product launchesJPMorgan Chase has 60 million customers digitally engaging with the bank.
Newly appointed CPO Rohan Amin and CIO Gill Haus join us on the podcast to discuss the future of the bank and the products and services it offers.
What’s Happening in Payments Ep. 3: Veem’s Marwan Forzley on the role of blockchain in B2B paymentsMarwan Forzley, co-founder and CEO of Veem, joins me on the podcast today. We discuss the advantages of blockchain-based B2B payments, limitations, regulatory challenges, and what the future holds for the space.
Fintech valuations seriously challenged after a booming 2021Private and public markets are taking a more cautious approach towards valuing fintechs, as the recent market sell-off coupled with macro headwinds are raising concerns.
This comes in contrast with the optimism displayed last year, which saw record numbers of capital pouring in the fintech sector, and wave of fintechs going public.
The Acquire Podcast Ep. 3: Give a little, get a lot – Ocrolus’ try and buy campaignOcrolus’ SVP of Product John Forrester joins the Acquire podcast to talk about the planning, challenges, and successes of launching a free trial that stands out. His advice to marketers: Over experiment and lead with data.
Behind Coinbase’s strategy to expand globally, leading with its walletCoinbase is undertaking a two-pronged strategy to grow internationally by entering markets at scale through the Coinbase Wallet.
The crypto exchange is learning from giants like WhatsApp to build a UX that performs well in diverse contexts.
How sibling-led Stax became fintech’s latest unicornStax recently raised $245 million to become Orlando’s first homegrown unicorn. Over the past three years, the firm has processed more than $23 billion in payments for 22,000 businesses across the US, growing by 500%.
Read the charts
1. How many clicks does it take to open a bank account?
Source: drmiguel.eth
2. What makes a company 'future ready'?
Source: Harvard Business Review
What we're reading
UBS expands flexible working options
In an extension of its current hybrid work arrangements, UBS is offering a 100% remote work option for eligible US-based employees (Financial Advisor IQ)
Bitcoin hot tub, anyone?
Here are some of the innovative and sometimes hilarious functions bitcoin miners have found for their rigs (CoinDesk)
Jamie Dimon’s monetary self-discipline now has a question mark after it
JPMorgan's chief Jamie Dimon is dealing with uncommon investor criticism over a multibillion-dollar plan to modernize the group’s know-how and the choice to enter the UK’s extremely aggressive retail-banking market (Financial Times)
UK Apple Card may be on the way
Apple has acquired a UK startup company that takes a new approach to assess the credit-worthiness of finance applicants (9to5Mac)
Recommended by LinkedIn
Will Google's move put pressure on Apple?
Google and Spotify said that a future version of the Spotify app will allow users to sign up inside the app to pay Spotify directly for a subscription (CNBC)
Figure Technologies is to roll out crypto-backed mortgages
Blockchain lending startup Figure Technologies unveiled Crypto Mortgage and Crypto Mortgage PLUS, both of which allow users to borrow against their bitcoin or ether to fund home purchases (CoinDesk)
Driveway & U.S. Bank piloting real-time payments
U.S. Bank and Driveway have collaborated to pay car sellers immediately with real-time payments, making Driveway the first online car dealership to pay customers over the RTP network (PYMNTS)
Technisys' Miguel Santos recaps his “20-year overnight success”
Technisys CEO Miguel Santos on the acquisition, the evolution of digital banking since the company’s launch two decades ago, and the current trends of BaaS and embedded finance in Latin America (LAVCA)
Cross River bolsters crypto services with Chainalysis
Cross River, a US provider of core infrastructure and embedded financial technology to fintech companies, has teamed up with blockchain data platform Chainalysis to expand its crypto services (Finextra)
BoA brings out new secured credit options for SMBs
Bank of America has launched its latest products and resources for entrepreneurs looking to start a small business or build their business' credit history (PYMNTS)
Jeeves Louise! That's a lot of cheese
Jeeves raises $180 million in its Series C round, just seven months after raising $57 million in its Series B round. (TechCrunch)
Stash's stock-back card's got some competition
Robinhood just launched its new debit card, which will allow users to round up change to the nearest dollar and invest in whichever assets they choose (Reuters)
Could ChargeAfter give banks an inroad to BNPL?
The multi-lender BNPL platform is looking at a $44 million Series B funding round, led by, among others, Citi Ventures (Finextra)
A little bit of the Matrix, a little bit of Land of the Apes
Yuga Labs, the company behind the NFT project Bored Ape Yacht Club, is now valued at $4 billion. Next on its list is dabbling in an NFT-based metaverse. (TechCrunch)
The first of its kind by a major U.S. bank
Goldman Sachs has teamed up with Galaxy Digital Holdings to execute its first over-the-counter crypto options transaction (Finextra)
"Ramp for Travel" is now operating
After $750 million funding, corporate card and expense platform Ramp is doubling down on its shift towards helping companies manage their travel, not just receipts (Skift)
Tomo aims to be a “PayPal for the mortgage industry”
Tomo, the company which speeds up the mortgage approval process, raised a $40 million Series A round at a $640 million valuation, doubling the company’s value after it raised a $70 million seed round last year (GeekWire)
Finally, the SMB accounting startup raises $95 million
Finally, a fintech startup with a mission to help small businesses automate their accounting and finance functions, announced a $95 million Series A, including both equity and debt (TechCrunch)
How the end of the zero-rate era will affect banks?
Banks funded with deposits may have an advantage over market-funded competitors as rates rise, but it isn’t insurmountable (The Wall Street Journal)
FreedomPay bags mobile POS deal with Sephora
FreedomPay, a leading commerce platform, partners with Sephora USA, to integrate FreedomPay’s data-driven commerce technology platform in Sephora’s 500 plus stores across America (Finextra)
FTX invests $100 million in banking app, Dave
Dave, a publicly-traded banking app, has made a strategic partnership with FTX US, the stateside arm of cryptocurrency exchange giant FTX (CoinDesk)
Big banks took $4.6 billion less in IPO fees this year
The 5 biggest US investment banks have generated $645 million from equity capital market fees so far this year (PYMNTS)
New hub for fledgling investment bankers
Citigroup is setting up a hub for junior bankers in Spain’s Costa del Sol, which will directly support teams of bankers working in established financial centers (Financial Times)
Banks want employees to retain face-to-face interaction
Many banks and credit unions are eager to get staff back into the office, but their employees don't seem to be on board (The Financial Brand)
Hubspot hack leads to data breaches
A data breach at Hubspot has affected BlockFi, Swan Bitcoin, NYDIG and Circle, but all companies say their operations have not been affected and treasuries are not at risk (CoinDesk)
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