Credit union members and community banking customers readily trust their credit unions and community banks with their capital when it comes to saving and borrowing. But what about investing? In most instances, those same members and customers will seek out other institutions and businesses when it comes to investing for the future and managing their wealth. What if credit unions and community banks instead could keep those members and customers by catering to their investing and wealth management needs? How might this positively impact customer and member relationships and deepen engagement? This week, our Finovate First-Timers series features Ariel Leachman, Co-founder and Chief Operating Officer at Bluum Finance. Headquartered in Los Angeles, California and founded in 2025, Bluum Finance offers a unified platform for embedded wealth management and investing, providing brokerage and AI-powered advisory infrastructure via APIs. The company combines multi-asset, multi-market brokerage, custody, and reporting in a single integration, enabling credit unions, banks, and fintechs to offer seamless investing experiences for their members and customers. Bluum Finance made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2026 in San Diego. Co-founder Ope Sonusi is CEO. In our conversation, Leachman discusses the opportunity that credit unions and community banks have by integrating investing and wealth management capabilities directly into their existing platforms. Leachman also explains how Bluum Finance streamlines the process for smaller financial institutions, delivering access to a range of asset classes and international markets via a single API. Finally, she shares her thoughts on what it will take to make cross-border investing as easy and commonplace as cross-border payments. What problem does Bluum Finance solve and who does it solve it for? Ariel Leachman: Credit unions, community financial institutions, and consumer fintechs have built strong relationships with their customers. The challenge is that when those customers are ready to start investing and building wealth, they often have to leave for another platform. Bluum enables fintechs and financial institutions to launch investing and wealth management directly within their existing platform, enabling them to expand their offering, generate new revenue, and strengthen customer relationships. How does Bluum solve this problem better than other companies? Leachman: Many embedded investing platforms focus primarily on trade execution. We take a broader approach by combining multi-asset investing, AI-powered wealth management, and the underlying brokerage infrastructure in a single platform. Rather than having to stitch together brokerage, custody, compliance, reporting, and portfolio guidance from multiple providers, our partners can launch through one API while we manage much of the complexity behind the scenes. Our platform also supports a range of asset classes and international markets, giving financial institutions a single platform to help their customers build diversified investment portfolios. Who are Bluum’s primary customers and how do you reach them? Leachman: Our primary customers are consumer fintechs, community banks, and credit unions that want to add investing and wealth management to their existing product offering without the high cost and operational lift of building a brokerage platform from scratch. Most of these institutions already have strong customer relationships and are looking for practical ways to expand their offering while keeping the experience simple for both their teams and customers. We primarily reach them through direct relationships, strategic partnerships, and industry events like Finovate. Can you tell us about a favorite implementation or deployment of your technology, or a particularly valuable partnership experience? Leachman: One of the most rewarding parts of building Bluum has been working with financial institutions that genuinely want to help their customers build long-term wealth. Credit unions, in particular, have earned a tremendous amount of trust within their communities. Helping them extend that relationship beyond everyday banking into investing feels especially meaningful because it allows more people to access wealth-building tools through an institution they already know and trust. What in your background gave you the confidence to respond to this challenge? Leachman: As co-founders, we’ve spent years working in financial services and technology before launching Bluum. My co-founder, Ope Sonusi, spent his career building fintech platforms for US and international markets, and I spent my career in investment banking and private equity, building deep expertise in capital markets, investment products, and financial institutions. As we spent more time speaking with financial institutions and fintechs, one thing became clear: many wanted to offer investing, but the infrastructure required to do it was too costly and complex. That insight became the foundation for building a platform like Bluum Finance. You demoed at FinovateSpring in May of this year. How was the experience? Leachman: FinovateSpring was a great experience. It gave us the opportunity to demo the Bluum platform and engage directly with credit unions, community financial institutions, fintechs, and industry leaders to better understand their priorities around investing, wealth management, and member engagement. The event reinforced our view that embedded investing and wealth management are becoming essential components of the modern digital banking experience, and that financial institutions are looking for simple, compliant solutions they can bring to market quickly. You have talked about the opportunities in frontier and emerging markets and how the challenge is making cross-border investing as seamless as cross-border payments. Can you elaborate on this idea? Leachman: Cross-border payments have become dramatically easier over the past decade. Today, a financial institution can enable cross-border payments through a single integration without having to build the underlying infrastructure. Cross-border investing hasn’t evolved in the same way. Offering investment access across markets still requires coordinating brokers, custody providers, regulatory requirements, and reporting, which creates a lot of complexity. Our goal is to simplify that experience so financial institutions can offer access to both US and international markets without having to manage the high cost and onerous operational lift themselves. We believe the next evolution of financial services will make cross-border investing as seamless and accessible across global markets. What are your goals for Bluum Finance over the balance of 2026 and into next year? Leachman: We are focused on growing our partnerships with financial institutions, consumer fintechs, and credit unions. We’ve seen strong interest from institutions that want to offer investing but don’t want to build and operate the infrastructure themselves, so we’re focused on helping more partners bring those capabilities to market. We’re also excited about expanding the range of investment opportunities available through Bluum, including private markets and digital assets. Photo by PiggyBank on Unsplash The post Ariel Leachman of Bluum Finance on the Rise of Embedded Investing appeared first on Finovate.       

Connect Credit Union, a Florida-based financial institution with $103 million in assets, has partnered with smart financial calculator builder, Appli. Appli’s AI-powered calculators are designed to turn passive visitors into active financial consumers by enabling them to assess loan opportunities, calculate property values in real-time, plan for retirement, and more. Founded in 2024 and headquartered in Cedar Hills, Utah, Appli made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2025 in New York. Florida-based Connect Credit Union has teamed up with Appli, builder of AI-powered smart financial calculators, to provide members with a new, interactive way to learn about their lending options, assess how best to save for future goals, and identify optimal savings instruments. “Connect’s members are digitally savvy, and they expect that from every part of their credit union experience now, not just online banking,” Appli CEO Tim Pranger said. “Rolling this out right after their website relaunch means members will see it as part of one connected upgrade, not a separate tool bolted on later.” Appli’s AI-powered smart financial calculators are designed to convert passive visitors into active financial consumers. Embedded in websites, mobile banking apps, and across marketing campaigns, Appli’s solutions deliver real-time, personalized experiences that boost consumer confidence and drive conversions, giving financial institutions the ability to guide customers and members through major loan and savings decisions. The credit union will use Appli’s calculators for auto loans, personal loans, mortgages, and balance transfers. Scheduled to go live with the new offering in September, Connect Credit Union anticipates introducing smart calculators for other products over time. The partnership comes in the wake of the credit union’s website relaunch of its website, making the calculators part of the institution’s brand refresh. “Financial decisions can feel overwhelming, particularly when members are trying to determine what fits comfortably within their budgets,” Connect Credit Union EVP/COO Cynthia Ryan said. “Appli gives our members an easy, interactive way to explore financial scenarios, better understand their options, and make decisions with greater confidence. This partnership allows us to combine the convenience of technology with the personal service and trusted guidance our members expect from Connect Credit Union.” Connect Credit Union serves employees of the State of Florida, retirees of the Florida Department of Transportation, and those who live and work in Martin, St. Lucie, Indian River, De Soto, Glades, Okeechobee, and Charlotte counties in south and central Florida. Founded in 1962, the financial institution has $103 million in assets and offers services and products including auto loans, mortgages, home equity and personal loans, debit and credit cards, as well as savings, checking, and money market accounts. Founded in 2024 and headquartered in Cedar Hills, Utah, Appli made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2025. At the conference, the company demonstrated its Smart Financial Calculators and its newest loan lead generation platform. Appli’s technology is designed to capture high-intent shoppers, convert interest into action, and provide financial institutions with data-driven insights to help them grow deposits, increase loan volume, and secure long-term revenue growth. Interested in companies that are developing innovative solutions for credit unions and their members? FinovateFall 2026 will feature a special credit union spotlight and networking session on Tuesday, September 8. Learn more about this unique, invite-only opportunity. Photo by Roman on Unsplash The post Connect Credit Union Turns to Appli for AI-Powered Smart Financial Calculators appeared first on Finovate.       

When we announced IMPACT Funders & Founders, we described it as a new kind of event designed to bring together fintech founders and the investors backing the next generation of fintech in a setting built for meaningful conversations, targeted networking, and real fundraising opportunities. Now, we’re excited to share our speaker lineup. The inaugural IMPACT event, taking place alongside FinovateFall on September 11 in New York City, features venture capitalists, startup founders, corporate investors, accelerators, and ecosystem builders who are actively shaping fintech’s next chapter. Rather than focusing on broad industry trends alone, these speakers will tackle the practical questions founders and investors face every day, such as raising capital, scaling a company, navigating exits, leveraging AI, embedded finance, and the changing venture landscape. Learn from investors writing today’s checks Whether you’re raising your first institutional round or preparing for growth-stage funding, one of the biggest advantages of IMPACT is direct access to active investors. The speaker roster includes partners from venture capital firms, private equity firms, and strategic investors who are evaluating fintech opportunities every day. They’ll discuss what they’re looking for in founders, how investment priorities are evolving, and where they see the greatest opportunities in today’s market. Hear from founders who’ve been there Building a fintech company is about far more than securing funding. IMPACT speakers include founders who have navigated product launches, customer acquisition, regulatory hurdles, hiring, scaling, and fundraising firsthand. Expect candid conversations about the realities of building a fintech company, including the lessons learned from both successes and setbacks. Gain practical insights from fintech operators Alongside founders and investors, the program features experienced executives from banks, fintechs, and industry organizations who understand what it takes to bring new financial products to market. Sessions will explore topics including: AI and emerging technologies Go-to-market strategy Customer acquisition and growth Bank partnerships Regulatory considerations Fundraising strategy Scaling operations Explore the full speaker lineup The IMPACT speaker roster continues to grow as additional investors, founders, and industry leaders are announced, but here is a taste of who you can expect to see on stage. Browse the complete speaker lineup to see who will be joining us in New York. If you’re looking to connect with the people funding and building the future of fintech, there’s still time to register. Photo by Clint Patterson on Unsplash The post Meet the Investors, Founders, and Operators Taking the Stage at Our IMPACT Funders & Founders Event appeared first on Finovate.       

Digital payments giant Visa has agreed to acquire fraud and financial crime prevention platform BioCatch for $2.4 billion in cash. The acquisition will add to Visa’s existing cyber, fraud, risk, and security solutions and provide greater defense against newer threats including account takeover and money mule fraud. BioCatch was founded in 2011. The company made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2014 in New York. Visa has inked a definitive agreement to acquire behavioral and device intelligence innovator BioCatch. Visa will purchase the company from funds advised by Permira and other shareholders for $2.4 billion in cash. The move will add to Visa’s current array of cyber, fraud, risk, and security solutions and is expected to be especially helpful in managing threats such as account takeovers, scams, money mules, and application fraud. Subject to customary closing conditions, including receipt of all relevant regulatory approvals, the acquisition is expected to close by the end of Visa’s fiscal Q2 of 2027. “Real-time insights into customer intent continue to grow increasingly essential for institutions to establish trust within digital banking sessions,” BioCatch CEO Gadi Mazor said. “For more than a decade, we’ve demonstrated behavior’s unique ability to distinguish the criminal from the legitimate. In the last couple of years, we’ve shown how real-time intelligence-sharing networks between our customers can amplify the power of our behavioral intelligence further still. Together with Visa, we’re even better positioned to advance our mission of making the world a safer place to transact and protect consumers from financial crime.” BioCatch offers AI and machine learning-based solutions that analyze thousands of application, behavioral, device, and network signals such as keystrokes and mouse activity, touch gestures, and device handling. This enables BioCatch’s technology to detect fraud and distinguish between legitimate and fraudulent users in real time. BioCatch’s models provide continuous monitoring to assess user intent and identify signs of potential coercion or manipulation throughout the digital banking session. More than 350 financial institutions around the world leverage BioCatch’s technology to protect 760+ million users from fraud and financial crime. Visa’s acquisition of BioCatch comes at a time when AI, biometrics, identity, cyber defense, and fraud prevention are converging. To this point, in addition to this week’s transaction, Visa has launched its Visa Vulnerability Agentic Harness solution, an open-source, AI security tool to help customers spot and mitigate vulnerabilities at scale. Visa noted in a statement that, over the last five years, the company has invested more than $13 billion in technology and infrastructure to secure its payments ecosystem and drive fraud rates lower. “Account takeovers and scams cost the global economy over $1 trillion annually and AI is enabling these attacks at unprecedented scale,” Visa’s president of value-added services Andrew Torre said. “BioCatch will help our clients stop fraud before it reaches the point of payment. This acquisition is part of our strategy to help clients prevent cyber threats upstream, building trust into every transaction.” Founded in 2011 and headquartered in New York, BioCatch made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2014. In the years since then, the company has grown into a major financial crime prevention platform analyzing 18 billion user sessions per month and protecting 1.7 billion devices. In 2025 alone, BioCatch assessed more than $17 trillion in transactions and prevented $4 billion in fraud. Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash The post Visa Acquires Behavioral Biometrics Innovator BioCatch for $2.4 Billion appeared first on Finovate.       

August is off to an auspicious start in the fintech world, with news of acquisitions in behavioral biometrics and regtech, and good news for a pair of firms seeking approval to initiate digital asset operations in New York and the UK, respectively. Be sure to swing by Finovate’s Fintech Rundown all week long for the latest updates and fintech headlines! Wealth management Asset and wealth management software specialist ZILO launches its digital transfer agency platform, integration mutual fund administration with digital asset capabilities. Payments London-based financial services provider Teya unveils new payments card machine. Fraud prevention Visa agrees to acquire behavioral biometrics company BioCatch for $2.4 billion in cash. Bank of America to acquire UK-based information security firm MDSec Consulting. Digital assets Circle secures limited purpose trust charter from the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS). Robinhood receives authorization from the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to offer cryptocurrency services in the country. Capital markets tokenization platform Licuido announces strategic investment from Ripple. Unlimit Crypto, a division of financial infrastructure company Unlimit, secures a Crypto-Asset Service Provider license from the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission. Regtech Enterprise financial controls and reconciliation automation company AutoRek acquires UK-based compliance platform Grath. Credit unions Appli, maker of AI-powered smart financial calculators, inks partnership with Florida-based Connect Credit Union. Photo by Christina & Peter from Pexels The post Fintech Rundown: A Rapid Review of Weekly News appeared first on Finovate.       

InvestiFi raised $20 million in a strategic funding round led largely by credit unions and fintech investors to expand its embedded investing platform for community financial institutions. Community banks and credit unions are increasingly competing with fintechs like Robinhood, Wealthfront, Betterment, and Coinbase for the primary customer relationship, making embedded investing a key retention strategy. The investor lineup signals strong industry confidence that integrated wealth management tools will be critical for smaller financial institutions to remain competitive with digital-first providers. Credit Union Service Organization (CUSO) InvestiFi has landed $20 million in a funding round led by Vibe Credit Union, with participation from BankTech Ventures, ICCU (Idaho Central Credit Union), Navari (formerly CUSG), United Financial Credit Union, Coastal Credit Union, Mid Minnesota Credit Union, Truity Credit Union, and Southpoint Credit Union. “What makes this raise especially meaningful is that so much of it comes directly from the consumer-focused financial institutions and strategic partners who use our platform every day,” said InvestiFi CEO and Founder Kian Sarreshteh. “They aren’t just customers — they’re believers in our mission to democratize investing and to make sure community financial institutions can compete and win in this space.” InvestiFi plans to use today’s funds to scale its platform and increase adoption among credit union members and community bank customers. Specifically, the organization’s goal is to help these smaller financial institutions retain and gain back deposits from the 43% of Millennial and Gen Z users who have transitioned to third-party investment platforms because they felt that their credit union or community bank didn’t offer adequate investing options. While community banks and credit unions used to compete against each other and larger banks, this is no longer the case. Fintechs like Robinhood, Wealthfront, Betterment, and Coinbase have become commonplace among users. And because these fintech options are increasingly offering savings tools, checking accounts, and even credit cards, there is also increased competition for the primary customer relationship. InvestiFi’s tools that allow community banks and credit unions to embed investing tools directly within their website or app will help retain primacy. The makeup of the investor base is perhaps as noteworthy as its size. With many of InvestiFi’s own credit union customers participating, the raise shows how community financial institutions are increasingly investing in fintech infrastructure they view as essential to remaining competitive with larger banks and digital-first financial providers. “For generations, credit unions have earned trust by helping members save, borrow, and achieve their financial goals,” said Vibe Credit Union Chief Operations and Strategy Officer Jeff Pascoe. “The next chapter is helping them build wealth through that same trusted partnership. As a credit union, we believe we have a responsibility to invest in innovations that strengthen not only our own members’ experience, but the future of the credit union movement itself. InvestiFi helps make that future possible.” InvestiFi, which enables credit unions and community banks to offer digital investing directly within online banking, was founded in 2020. The organization helps its 60 financial institution clients offer tools like fractional investing, guided investing, IRAs, cryptocurrency trading, and stablecoins. Interested in hearing more about specialized tools for community banks or credit unions? Register for FinovateFall and enroll in the Credit Union Spotlight or the Community Bank Spotlight to get a dedicated networking space where you can share best practices, talk through common challenges, and discover innovative solutions designed for you. Photo by RDNE Stock project The post CUSO InvestiFi Raises $20 Million to Help Community Banks and Credit Unions Retain Deposits appeared first on Finovate.       

In the run-up to FinovateFall, which takes place on September 9 through 11 in New York, we asked several speakers for their perspectives on technologies shaping financial services, the biggest challenges facing banks, and why they keep coming back to Finovate. Below is a preview of what five speakers had to say ahead of this year’s event. Michael Reynolds, Business Technology Executive at KeyBank Michael Reynolds leads intelligent automation at KeyBank, where he oversees robotic process automation, intelligent document processing, low-code development, and generative AI initiatives. Under his leadership, KeyBank’s digital workforce now performs the equivalent of more than 500 employees’ worth of work. Why Finovate? “Finovate is one of the few conferences where you can see real, working technology, not concept slides. The live demo format lets banks quickly assess what is production-ready, identify emerging fintech partners, and compare innovation across multiple categories in just a few days. Finovate highlights hundreds of fintech demos and attracts a large audience of banking decision-makers, making it a highly practical venue for both learning and networking.” What will banks need to prioritize over the next 18 months? “Banks will need to prioritize AI-powered productivity and agentic automation. The winners will be institutions that combine AI with strong governance, security, and operational integration, not those simply deploying chatbots.” Where is AI making the biggest impact today? “Inside our organization, the most immediate impact is in operations and employee productivity: automating manual processes, accelerating knowledge retrieval, improving service delivery, and helping teams focus more time on higher value work while maintaining appropriate controls and oversight.” Sam Kilmer, Managing Director at Cornerstone Advisors Sam Kilmer leads Cornerstone Advisors’ work with fintechs, financial institutions, and private equity firms. A longtime banking executive and host of the Fintech Hustle podcast, he spends much of his time helping organizations navigate innovation and partnerships. Why Finovate? “Finovate is fast-paced, so likes hit fast and dislikes are over quickly. It exposes me to a lot of earlier stage companies.” What should the industry focus on next? “Banks will need to improve showing outcomes and storytelling authentically to stand out from increasingly AI-generated content and claims.” Andrew Endicott, CoFounder at Gilgamesh Ventures Andrew Endicott is Co-Founder of Gilgamesh Ventures, an early-stage fintech venture capital firm investing globally in companies from pre-seed through Series A. Before becoming an investor, he co-founded credit card fintech Petal and recently authored the book Is Finance Technology? Why Finovate? “Great mix of financial institutions and fintechs all in one place. Really excited to be part of it.” What financial services problem still needs solving? “There are many problems in finance that are unsolved, but I feel that wire transfers are a big one.” Katherine Avery, Founder at Chimayo Consulting Katherine Avery is founder of Chimayo Consulting and a veteran enterprise risk executive with more than two decades of experience spanning banking, capital markets, commodities, digital assets, and AI governance. She helps financial institutions build governance frameworks that keep pace with rapidly evolving technology. Why Finovate? “Finovate earns its place because it’s practitioner driven rather than vendor theater. The demos are live and unscripted, judged by people who actually implement this technology, which forces a level of rigor other conferences don’t demand.” What should banks prioritize over the next 18 months? “Banks need to operationalize AI governance now, not after deployment. The institutions that treat model risk management, explainability, and third party AI oversight as foundational, rather than bolted on post-launch, will be the ones still standing when regulators catch up to the pace of adoption, which they will within this window.” What is one change you believe will fundamentally reshape fintech in the next five years? “The change I believe will fundamentally reshape fintech in the next five years is the shift from AI as a discrete tool to AI as an embedded decision maker across underwriting, monitoring, and customer interaction. That shift collapses the old boundary between innovation and risk functions. Governance can no longer sit downstream of deployment.” What is one fintech trend you believe will accelerate in the final quarter of 2026? “One trend I expect to accelerate in Q4 2026 is the move toward agentic AI in back office and compliance functions. Institutions are getting more comfortable letting AI take bounded, delegated actions in monitoring and control testing, and that comfort will keep building through year end.” What is one problem in financial services that fintech still hasn’t solved well enough yet? “The problem fintech still hasn’t solved well enough is third party risk visibility. Banks are stitching together more vendors and platforms than ever, and most risk frameworks still can’t see deep enough into that supply chain to catch concentration or contagion risk before it becomes a real event, not just a checkbox on an assessment.” Vivek Valecha, SVP of Intelligent Automation at Xebia Vivek is Senior Vice President of Intelligent Automation at digital engineering company Xebia, where he leads the charge on Agentic AI to help enterprises move beyond automation into autonomous, intelligent decision-making that reimagines customer experience and unlock new levels of employee productivity. Why Finovate? “Finovate stands apart because it’s built for demos, not just discussions. It’s one of the few conferences where banks and fintechs see technology in action rather than in slide decks — that hands-on, no-fluff format is exactly where real partnerships and practical ideas take shape.” What should banks prioritize over the next 18 months? “Banks should prioritize agentic AI. Banks have spent the last few years automating discrete tasks — the next wave is about deploying AI agents that can reason, make decisions, and orchestrate multi-step processes with minimal human intervention. Institutions that move from “AI-assisted” to “AI-agentic” will have a real competitive edge in speed, cost, and customer experience.” What is one change you believe will fundamentally reshape fintech in the next five years? “In five years, autonomous AI agents will handle entire workflows—from underwriting to fraud investigation to customer servicing—with humans stepping in only for exceptions. That shift won’t just improve efficiency; it will fundamentally redefine what “operations” even means inside a bank.” See them on stage at FinovateFall These are just a few of the perspectives you’ll hear at FinovateFall this September. From AI governance and intelligent automation to venture investing and emerging fintech trends, our speakers bring firsthand experience from the institutions building—and funding—the future of financial services. Browse the full agenda and register today to hear these experts, watch live fintech demos, and connect with leaders from across the banking and fintech ecosystem. Photo by Leeloo The First The post Meet Five FinovateFall Speakers: Their Thoughts on AI, Banking, and What’s Next appeared first on Finovate.       

In the run-up to FinovateFall, which takes place on September 9 through 11 in New York, we asked several speakers for their perspectives on technologies shaping financial services, the biggest challenges facing banks, and why they keep coming back to Finovate. Below is a preview of what four speakers had to say ahead of this year’s event. Michael Reynolds, Business Technology Executive at KeyBank Michael Reynolds leads intelligent automation at KeyBank, where he oversees robotic process automation, intelligent document processing, low-code development, and generative AI initiatives. Under his leadership, KeyBank’s digital workforce now performs the equivalent of more than 500 employees’ worth of work. Why Finovate? “Finovate is one of the few conferences where you can see real, working technology, not concept slides. The live demo format lets banks quickly assess what is production-ready, identify emerging fintech partners, and compare innovation across multiple categories in just a few days. Finovate highlights hundreds of fintech demos and attracts a large audience of banking decision-makers, making it a highly practical venue for both learning and networking.” What will banks need to prioritize over the next 18 months? “Banks will need to prioritize AI-powered productivity and agentic automation. The winners will be institutions that combine AI with strong governance, security, and operational integration, not those simply deploying chatbots.” Where is AI making the biggest impact today? “Inside our organization, the most immediate impact is in operations and employee productivity: automating manual processes, accelerating knowledge retrieval, improving service delivery, and helping teams focus more time on higher value work while maintaining appropriate controls and oversight.” Sam Kilmer, Managing Director at Cornerstone Advisors Sam Kilmer leads Cornerstone Advisors’ work with fintechs, financial institutions, and private equity firms. A longtime banking executive and host of the Fintech Hustle podcast, he spends much of his time helping organizations navigate innovation and partnerships. Why Finovate? “Finovate is fast-paced, so likes hit fast and dislikes are over quickly. It exposes me to a lot of earlier stage companies.” What should the industry focus on next? “Banks will need to improve showing outcomes and storytelling authentically to stand out from increasingly AI-generated content and claims.” Andrew Endicott, CoFounder at Gilgamesh Ventures Andrew Endicott is Co-Founder of Gilgamesh Ventures, an early-stage fintech venture capital firm investing globally in companies from pre-seed through Series A. Before becoming an investor, he co-founded credit card fintech Petal and recently authored the book Is Finance Technology? Why Finovate? “Great mix of financial institutions and fintechs all in one place. Really excited to be part of it.” What financial services problem still needs solving? “There are many problems in finance that are unsolved, but I feel that wire transfers are a big one.” Katherine Avery, Founder at Chimayo Consulting Katherine Avery is founder of Chimayo Consulting and a veteran enterprise risk executive with more than two decades of experience spanning banking, capital markets, commodities, digital assets, and AI governance. She helps financial institutions build governance frameworks that keep pace with rapidly evolving technology. Why Finovate? “Finovate earns its place because it’s practitioner driven rather than vendor theater. The demos are live and unscripted, judged by people who actually implement this technology, which forces a level of rigor other conferences don’t demand.” What should banks prioritize over the next 18 months? “Banks need to operationalize AI governance now, not after deployment. The institutions that treat model risk management, explainability, and third party AI oversight as foundational, rather than bolted on post-launch, will be the ones still standing when regulators catch up to the pace of adoption, which they will within this window.” What is one change you believe will fundamentally reshape fintech in the next five years? “The change I believe will fundamentally reshape fintech in the next five years is the shift from AI as a discrete tool to AI as an embedded decision maker across underwriting, monitoring, and customer interaction. That shift collapses the old boundary between innovation and risk functions. Governance can no longer sit downstream of deployment.” What is one fintech trend you believe will accelerate in the final quarter of 2026? “One trend I expect to accelerate in Q4 2026 is the move toward agentic AI in back office and compliance functions. Institutions are getting more comfortable letting AI take bounded, delegated actions in monitoring and control testing, and that comfort will keep building through year end.” What is one problem in financial services that fintech still hasn’t solved well enough yet? “The problem fintech still hasn’t solved well enough is third party risk visibility. Banks are stitching together more vendors and platforms than ever, and most risk frameworks still can’t see deep enough into that supply chain to catch concentration or contagion risk before it becomes a real event, not just a checkbox on an assessment.” See them on stage at FinovateFall These are just a few of the perspectives you’ll hear at FinovateFall this September. From AI governance and intelligent automation to venture investing and emerging fintech trends, our speakers bring firsthand experience from the institutions building—and funding—the future of financial services. Browse the full agenda and register today to hear these experts, watch live fintech demos, and connect with leaders from across the banking and fintech ecosystem. Photo by Leeloo The First The post Meet Four FinovateFall Speakers: Their Thoughts on AI, Banking, and What’s Next appeared first on Finovate.       

MoonPay launched PayBox, enabling ChatGPT and Claude users to authorize AI agents to make purchases, trade tokens, interact with DeFi, and move assets using natural language. The platform combines Visa’s agentic commerce protocol, x402, and cryptographic security to let AI transact while keeping users’ card details and wallet keys protected. PayBox reflects the growing shift toward agentic commerce, as companies build the payment infrastructure that will enable AI agents to transact safely on users’ behalf. Stablecoin infrastructure provider MoonPay launched PayBox this week. The new payment vault allows users’ AI agents to trade tokens, bridge assets, interact with DeFi, and transact online without leaving the conversation. The new capability enables Claude and ChatGPT users with a PayBox connector to offer their AI the ability to transact by describing what they want in natural language. In addition to requesting their AI to make purchases like booking a flight, customers can also ask things like, “Maximize yield using Aave” or “Onramp $100 into PYUSD.”  After the user installs PayBox on Claude or ChatGPT, the AI prepares the transaction, then the user approves the transaction with a passkey and PayBox moves the money without having to involve a developer tool or third party. MoonPay is using x402, an open protocol that enables AI agents and web services to initiate and settle payments programmatically across the internet, to allow AI to pay any service on the consumer’s behalf. PayBox works with two payment methods, cards and wallets, both of which are kept secure. MoonPay leverages Visa’s agentic commerce protocol to avoid seeing or storing full payment details, while wallet keys are protected by threshold cryptography and secure enclaves. These protections never offer MoonPay or the agent access the full private key or allow the agent to sign transactions without user approval. Users can choose between an approval mode, in which every transaction requires passkey confirmation, or an autonomous mode that lets AI agents complete transactions within user-defined spending limits and policies. Even in autonomous mode, the agent never gains access to users’ card credentials or wallet private keys. “The card hid the cash. The phone hid the card. This is the era where money disappears into conversation,” said MoonPay CEO and Founder Ivan Soto-Wright. “Billions of AI agents are coming online, and every one of them will need to hold, move, and spend money safely. Someone had to build the trust layer for that world. We just did. PayBox is the product that MoonPay was built to make.” Agentic commerce is moving beyond experimentation as AI assistants are starting to complete transactions on users’ behalf. To capture this opportunity, companies are racing to provide the payment layer for AI agents, especially as stablecoin infrastructure, payment networks such as Visa, and emerging standards like x402 continue to converge. PayBox is launching with support for Solana, Ethereum, Hyperliquid, Tempo, Base, Robinhood Chain, Arbitrum, and Polygon, with plans to add more chains. The first PayBox integrations are already live, and MoonPay expects to introduce additional use cases every week. Additionally, MoonPay noted that support for AI platforms beyond Claude and ChatGPT is coming soon. The post MoonPay Lets AI Agents Transact with PayBox appeared first on Finovate.       

While it used to be largely experimental, AI has quickly evolved into a practical tool that is reshaping how banks and fintechs operate. Today’s AI platforms are helping bankers, advisors, operations teams, and customer service representatives work more efficiently by automating routine tasks, surfacing insights faster, and reducing the amount of manual work required to serve customers. At FinovateFall 2026, which takes place September 9 through 11 in New York, we’ll see 68 companies take the demo stage, more than a dozen of which will use their seven-minute slot on stage to demonstrate how they’re putting AI to work across financial services. From advisor copilots and employee training to customer support, analytics, workflow automation, and personalized banking experiences, these fintechs are helping financial institutions become more productive without sacrificing the customer and partner relationships that remain central to banking. Below are 14 companies that will showcase how AI can help banks, credit unions, and fintechs work smarter. AdvisorHelpAI AdvisorHelpAI equips financial advisors with an AI-powered assistant designed specifically for wealth management. The platform helps advisors quickly access firm knowledge, prepare for client meetings, summarize documents, and streamline administrative work, allowing advisors to spend more time building client relationships instead of searching for information. Covecta Covecta uses AI to help financial institutions automate knowledge work and improve operational efficiency. By organizing institutional knowledge and making it instantly accessible through conversational AI, the platform helps employees find answers faster and reduces time spent navigating internal documentation and procedures. CUltivate Built specifically for credit unions, CUltivate leverages AI to improve employee productivity and member service. The platform helps staff quickly locate policies, procedures, and operational guidance, enabling faster responses while creating a more consistent member experience. FinzeeAI FinzeeAI helps credit unions connect biometric data from wearables to real-time financial decisions in order to stop impulse buying before it happens. The company provides an intelligence layer between the user’s money and their health to intervene in real time when the shopper’s body signals stress, stopping the impulse purchase from happening. GPTAdvisor GPTAdvisor brings generative AI capabilities to financial advisors, helping automate research, summarize complex financial information, and assist with client communications. The platform aims to reduce administrative burdens while allowing advisors to focus on delivering higher-value financial advice. Inbenta Inbenta combines conversational AI, chatbots, and intelligent search to improve customer support. Its platform enables financial institutions to resolve customer inquiries more quickly through self-service while seamlessly escalating more complex issues to human representatives when needed. Lemonade LXP Lemonade LXP helps banks train and support employees using AI-powered learning experiences. Rather than relying on static training materials, financial institutions can provide personalized guidance that helps employees build knowledge, stay compliant, and confidently serve customers. Palomonte Labs Palomonte Labs’ Cube2 makes financial APIs AI-readable to enable developers and AI agents to safely understand and execute financial integrations. The AI infrastructure enables AI agents to automate financial integrations and maps business use cases into validated AI workflows. Pyramid Insights Pyramid Insights applies artificial intelligence to help financial institutions uncover meaningful business insights from large volumes of operational and customer data. By surfacing trends, opportunities, and performance metrics more quickly, the platform supports better-informed business decisions. ScreenSteps ScreenSteps provides AI-assisted employee guidance that helps frontline staff complete complex banking processes accurately and consistently. The platform delivers step-by-step instructions within existing workflows, reducing training time while improving service quality and compliance. Titan AI Titan AI helps financial institutions automate routine banking tasks while providing employees with AI-powered assistance for everyday operations. The company’s platform is designed to improve efficiency, reduce manual effort, and enhance customer service across the organization. Tweezr Tweezr uses AI to simplify internal workflows and help teams complete operational tasks more efficiently. By reducing repetitive manual work and improving process execution, the platform enables financial institutions to accomplish more with existing resources. Ventus AI Ventus AI transforms raw banking transactions into semantic customer intelligence, enabling personalized experiences, smarter analytics, and human-centered digital banking without changing core infrastructure. The tool offers plug-in intelligence for any core banking system, turns transactions into dynamic personas, and detects life events before customers tell their bank. Vertice Analytics AI Vertice AI’s OPTIMIZE transforms institutional growth goals into optimized, AI-executed marketing campaigns with human approval at the strategic level. The company offers autonomous campaign planning and execution with one-click approval, delivers end-to-end, goal-driven campaign optimization, and provides AI-generated, compliant, personalized multi-channel marketing. Why banks should care The conversation around AI in banking has matured considerably over the past two years. Financial institutions are moving beyond asking whether they should adopt AI and are instead determining where it can deliver measurable value. The greatest opportunity often comes when eliminating the repetitive work that prevents employees from focusing on customers, strategic decisions, and higher-value activities. AI-powered copilots, knowledge assistants, workflow automation, and intelligent analytics can improve productivity across nearly every department, from the contact center and lending operations to wealth management and compliance. In looking at the companies demonstrating at FinovateFall 2026, it is clear that AI has become an enabling technology that touches every aspect of financial services. Whether banks are looking to improve employee efficiency, strengthen customer service, accelerate decision-making, or uncover deeper business insights, these solutions demonstrate practical ways to deploy AI today. For financial institutions seeking to compete in an increasingly digital marketplace, understanding these emerging capabilities may prove just as important as evaluating the next generation of payments, lending, or fraud technologies. Photo by Jakub Zerdzicki The post 14 AI Solutions that Help Banks Work Smarter appeared first on Finovate.       

AI-native lending platform EnFi has raised $15 million in Series A funding. The round was led by FINTOP and the investment brings the firm’s total capital raised to date to $22.5 million. The funds will be used to enable the Boston, Massachusetts-based fintech to scale its offering, grow its team, and boost its go-to-market efforts. EnFi made its Finovate debut last year at FinovateFall 2025 in New York. Co-founder Joshua Summers is CEO. Here’s some Finovate alumni funding news from earlier this year that slipped beneath our radar: EnFi, which leverages agentic AI to complete end-to-end commercial lending workflows, has raised $15 million in Series A funding. The Massachusetts-based fintech will use the capital to scale its technology, grow its team, and accelerate go-to-market efforts. The investment takes the company’s total funding to $22.5 million. The round was led by FINTOP, and featured participation from Patriot Financial Partners, Commerce Ventures, Unusual Ventures, and Boston Seed Capital. In its statement, the company noted that these investors collectively span more than 150 financial institutions. FINTOP’s network of strategic investors consists of approximately 90 community and regional banks. Patriot Financial Partners has invested in 66 banks through its three active funds. Commerce Ventures has more than 20 strategic enterprise limited partners (LPs), including seven of the largest banks in the US. EnFi enables commercial lenders to rapidly scale their portfolios while enhancing risk management. The firm’s AI agents can be deployed across the full commercial credit spectrum and loan lifecycle to boost the capacity of lending professionals by completing a range of end-to-end tasks, from deal screening to portfolio monitoring. Readily deployable and productive within 60—90 days, EnFi’s agents help lenders originate and manage more loans efficiently, leading to greater profitability and lower rates of loss. An under-discussed challenge for lenders in the US is what EnFi referred to as a “growing talent crisis.” Noting that “tens of thousands of credit analyst positions remain unfilled at any given time”—despite $112 billion spent annually on credit labor—many institutions have been compelled to make tradeoffs that undermine their potential as lenders. These include processing fewer loans, lowering underwriting standards, and overworking existing lending teams. This point was underscored by both FINTOP Partner John Philpott and Citadel Credit Union Chief Lending Officer Michael Desimone. Philpott warned that “the human talent pool cannot scale at the rate credit demand is growing.” Desimone highlighted the importance of being able to “respond to rising demand more efficiently without increasing … our risk profile, by extending the capacity of our credit teams.” Citadel Credit Union went public about its deployment of EnFi’s technology in February, when the funding announcement was made. “We have seen this consistently across hundreds of conversations with lenders,” EnFi Co-founder and CEO Joshua Summers said. “Our investors have wide exposure to the challenge through their banking LP networks and portfolio investments. They are investing in agentic human infrastructure, not just software. EnFi enables commercial lenders to operate beyond traditional capacity limits while strengthening risk oversight and accelerating credit decisions.” Founded in 2024 and headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, EnFi made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2025. At the conference, the company introduced its AI-native lending platform and showed how its suite of agentic AI solutions handles data ingestion and extraction, automated spreading, and relationship management. The technology also features orchestrations that combine agents into larger automated workflows such as deal screening, underwriting, and portfolio monitoring. EnFi’s agentic infrastructure delivers audit-ready accuracy with human oversight, enabling rapid deployment, full data access, and seamless legacy system integration for high-performance lending. Photo by Osman Rana on Unsplash The post EnFi Secures $15 Million to Bring Agentic AI to Commercial Lending appeared first on Finovate.       

Increase has launched Increase Bank, combining an FDIC-member institution with its API-first banking core and direct connections to the Federal Reserve, The Clearing House, and Visa. The company entered banking through its 2025 acquisition of Washington-based Twin City Bank, which continues serving existing community customers under the Twin City Bank name. By operating its own bank while continuing to work with partner banks, Increase is integrating more of the embedded-finance stack and gaining greater control over product development, compliance, payments, and economics. API-first banking fintech Increase is launching Increase Bank to bring its modern bank core to help businesses build and launch financial products. With today’s launch, Increase now includes Increase Bank, an FDIC-member institution, plus its built-from-scratch banking core with direct connections to the Federal Reserve, The Clearing House, and Visa. “This is a bank built by a team of product-obsessed operators for ambitious companies that are just as obsessed with building the best possible products for their customers,” said Increase Founder Darragh Buckley. “It is programmable at scale and designed for reliability, speed, and flexibility.” Rather than pursuing a new bank charter from scratch, Increase acquired Washington-based Twin City Bank in 2025, giving it a regulated banking institution to complement its API-first infrastructure platform. The single-branch bank now operates as Increase Bank while continuing to serve Twin City Bank’s existing community banking customers under the Twin City name. While the bank expands Increase’s role in the financial stack, the technology remains central to its strategy. Instead of serving exclusively as middleware between fintechs and sponsor banks, the company is integrating more of the stack by operating its own bank while continuing to partner with others. The move gives Increase greater control over product development, compliance, and payment operations, while positioning it to capture a larger share of the economics behind embedded finance. “A fintech company’s ability to scale often comes down to whether they have a banking partner that can move at their pace, build solutions to the edge cases they are solving, and give them direct access to payment rails,” said Stripe Head of International Diede van Lamoen. “Increase was built by people who have first-hand experience with these challenges and a drive to support users from the first payment to their billionth.” Founded in 2020, Increase provides the banking infrastructure behind companies including Gusto, Ramp, and Stripe. Its API-first platform enables developers to build products for money movement, deposit accounts, and card issuing using programmable banking components. Photo from Mike Hindle on Unsplash The post Increase Brings Banking and Banking Infrastructure Under One Roof appeared first on Finovate.       

Ramp has officially launched in Canada, marking the spend management platform’s first expansion outside the US and bringing its corporate cards, expense management, bill pay, and accounting tools to Canadian businesses. The Canadian platform includes localized features such as CAD and USD spending without FX markup, automatic GST/HST/PST/QST tax coding, Canadian-dollar accounting integrations, and cards issued through Peoples Trust. Ramp’s expansion comes as competition in business banking intensifies, following Expensify’s UK and EU corporate card launch and Intuit’s introduction of a QuickBooks-connected corporate credit card. Corporate card and expense management platform Ramp is moving across international borders this week. The New York-based company is now available to businesses in Canada. Today’s launch comes after Ramp piloted its Canadian operations with a select few Canada-based small businesses. With the broad launch, businesses headquartered in Canada can now use Ramp’s capabilities for managing spend, paying bills, and closing their books. Notably, Ramp is still not available to businesses based in Quebec or Saskatchewan. Ramp’s new Canadian operation is built for Canadian businesses, allowing businesses to spend in CAD and USD without additional FX markup. Additionally, the platform is designed to accommodate Canada’s tax system by automatically coding transactions with the appropriate GST, HST, PST, or QST, helping finance teams streamline expense management and tax compliance. The Canadian offering brings the same capabilities as the US platform, including corporate cards, expense management, reimbursements, bill pay, and accounting sync. However, Canadian businesses make payments in CAD and cards are issued through Peoples Trust. Card transactions sync natively with QuickBooks Online, Xero, Microsoft Business Central, NetSuite, and Sage Intacct in Canadian dollars. To support its Canadian expansion, Ramp will open its first office in Toronto, where it will build a local team to provide sales, implementation, and customer support for Canadian businesses. The local presence underscores Ramp’s longer-term investment in the Canadian market as it expands beyond the US. Ramp, which is used by over 70,000 businesses, was founded in 2019 and has experienced notable growth, most recently fueled by a $300 million financing round that valued it at $32 billion. The company powers over $100 billion in purchases annually. Interestingly, Ramp’s launch into Canada comes before the company’s expansion into the UK and EU, which Ramp announced would happen “this summer” after its March acquisition of Billhop, a Stockholm- and London-based payments platform. Today’s announcement comes at a time when competition in business banking is heating up. Just last week, Expensify launched its corporate card across the UK and EU, while five days ago, Intuit launched its own corporate credit card that will be connected to QuickBooks. Together, the moves underscore how providers are racing to expand both geographically and across the business finance stack, giving small and midsize businesses more integrated options for managing spending, payments, and accounting. Photo by Cedric Fauntleroy The post Ramp Expands Internationally into Canada appeared first on Finovate.       

Digital banking and client lifecycle management solutions provider Fenergo has launched Fen-AI, an agentic AI orchestration platform for banks. The Ireland-based company built Fen-AI to enable banks to automate routine client onboarding, due diligence, and ongoing compliance tasks while keeping human reviewers in control and maintaining an audit trail. “Risk moves in real time and regulation evolves continuously,” said Fenergo CEO Marc Murphy. “Yet the work of compliance still depends on review cycles built for a slower world. Fen-AI changes that. We’re enabling institutions to move from periodic control to continuous control, delivering faster client onboarding, greater operational efficiency, and stronger compliance without increasing risk or headcount.” Fen-AI uses an Agent-to-Agent (A2A) Interoperability Framework that allows banks to connect to Fenergo and third-party agents through a single interface. The platform authenticates requests, preserves context across handoffs, and attributes each completed action. Each outcome, along with its audit trail, is captured using the Fen-X Legal Entity System of Record. In addition to the audit trail, Fen-AI also reports on the value created by agentic capabilities. The reports enables teams to monitor the tasks completed by agents, the number of analyst hours saved, the amount of manual activity avoided, and more to identify where more automation or controls may be beneficial. Fen-AI powers Fenergo’s KYRA, an agentic workforce that coordinates banks’ internal AI-driven activity. With KYRA, every action, source, decision, and rationale is recorded as agents complete tasks. By automating processes using an agentic workforce while keeping a record of decisions and rationales, banks can increase the speed and scale of their CLM and KYC operations. “AI in financial institutions will succeed only if it’s built on trust. Regulators will not accept ‘the AI decided’ as an answer,” said Fenergo President and COO Hishaam Caramanli. “That is why we built governance into the foundation of Fen-AI from day one. Every action is attributable. Every decision is explainable. Every outcome is anchored to a trusted system of record. We are creating a new category for regulated industries: the governed agentic workforce.” Founded in 2009, Fenergo showcased its client onboarding tool at FinovateEurope 2012. The company provides client lifecycle management, know your customer, onboarding, transaction monitoring, anti-money laundering, sanctions screening, and regulatory compliance tools to more than 40% of the world’s top 50 banks and over 110 financial institutions. While today’s release includes six automation agents, Fenergo noted that additional Fen-AI capabilities will be introduced in the coming quarters. For banks, Fen-AI can help make their AI agents more useful in a regulated environment. Banks have been cautious about deploying agentic AI in compliance because they must be able to explain how decisions were made, identify which system or agent took an action, and produce evidence for regulators. With Fen-AI, banks can use agents to onboard more agents and implement continuous oversight without adding staff. The platform could also make it easier for banks to adopt AI from multiple vendors without losing control over how agents share information or complete tasks. Ultimately, however, Fen-AI’s impact will depend on how reliably the agents perform, how smoothly Fen-AI integrates with banks’ existing systems, and whether institutions can demonstrate measurable efficiency gains without weakening compliance controls. Photo by Brett Sayles The post Fenergo Launches AI Agent Orchestration Platform appeared first on Finovate.       

Agentic financial intelligence platform Kiro Money has teamed up with Houston, Texas-based Heritage Hub Federal Credit Union. Heritage Hub FCU, founded in 2025, will leverage Kiro Money’s technology to power its new Heritage Hub AI Money Coach, which provides members with personalized, expert-informed financial guidance. Headquartered in San Francisco, Kiro Money made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2026 in San Diego. Kiro Money, an embedded agentic financial intelligence layer for digital platforms, has announced a partnership with Heritage Hub Federal Credit Union. The Houston, Texas-based financial institution has teamed up with Kiro to deploy its new branded AI financial tool, the Heritage Hub AI Money Coach. Accessible directly from the Financial Literacy page of the credit union’s website and powered by Kiro’s AI, the new offering gives Heritage Hub FCU members access to personalized, expert-informed financial guidance—without requiring additional staff or scheduled appointments. “144.7 million Americans are credit union members, not customers, served by institutions built on ‘people helping people,’ not quarterly earnings,” Kiro Money CEO Alisha Chowdhury wrote on the company’s LinkedIn page. “They show up for the communities big banks overlook. But even the most mission-driven credit union can’t sit a coach next to every member, 24/7. That’s the gap Kiro Money closes.” The new offering is scheduled to launch on August 1 as a free resource for members. The AI money coach tracks member finances in real time, aggregating data across linked accounts to monitor multiple categories simultaneously. The solution tracks real-time bank account balances, integration data across institutions, historical spending patterns, cash flow, tax records, and investment portfolio information, including total asset holdings and performance returns. The AI money coach also tracks the user’s progress toward financial goals, such as buying a home, saving for retirement, and building an emergency fund. This enables the solution to provide accurate, contextual responses to a range of both common and complex financial queries. In a post on the Heritage Hub FCU’s LinkedIn page, the institution’s President and CEO Bolaji Ajimotokan discussed the current affordability challenges faced by many households and explained how this context helped convince him of the value of partnering with Kiro Money. “For many households … housing costs and insurance premiums, in particular, remain well above pre-pandemic levels, even as the rate of increase slows. That distinction matters. A slower rate of increase is not the same as relief, and for a lot of our members, the everyday questions haven’t gone away: How do I build a buffer for rising insurance costs? Is this the right time to lock in savings at a fixed rate? How do I budget when my fixed costs keep shifting? This is part of why we partnered with Kiro Money to launch the Heritage Hub AI Money Coach … to help members work through exactly these kinds of questions, grounded in our own products and expertise, whenever they come up.” Launched in October 2025 to serve underbanked African-American and Latino communities in the Houston area, Heritage Hub FCU offers free checking, competitive auto loans, high-interest money market accounts, and tax preparation services. Deposits are protected up to $250,000 by the National Credit Union Administration (NCUA) and the financial institution is Kiro’s first credit union partner. Founded in 2024 and headquartered in San Francisco, California, Kiro Money made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2026 in San Diego. At the conference, the company demonstrated its financial intelligence technology that routes financial queries from individuals to specialized agents capable of providing answers to complex financial questions, offering product recommendations, enabling account opening and portfolio adjustment, and more. Kiro’s AI chat agents also leverage real-time user context to identify “moments of intent” when customers need guidance. The white-label offering can be deployed securely via API or embedded code and features enterprise-grade security. Interested in companies developing solutions for credit unions? Our Credit Union Spotlight at FinovateFall is a unique opportunity for credit union executives to connect and network with a curated selection of fintechs with targeted solutions for credit unions. Find out more about this invite-only event. Photo by Dennis Lamberth on Unsplash The post Heritage Hub Federal Credit Union Partners with Kiro Money to Launch AI Money Coach appeared first on Finovate.       

It may feel like peak summer now, but the fall is right around the corner. That means our flagship fintech conference—FinovateFall 2026—is only weeks away! Don’t worry—you’ve got plenty of time to buy your ticket (taking advantage of early-bird savings) and book your room. You’ve also got all the time in the world to learn more about what we’ve got in store for you this year. We’ll be introducing many of the event’s top attractions over the coming days and weeks here on the Finovate blog. For now, to whet your appetite for our autumn event, here’s a look at the recently released FinovateFall 2026 agenda. Day One—September 9 FinovateFall 2026 starts strong with a battery of live, fintech demos featuring companies innovating in AI-enabled back-office automation, financial literacy, lending, transaction intelligence, embedded finance, and wealth management. The morning will also feature special addresses on topics such as AI and e-commerce and the global economic and geopolitical landscape. We will also present our Breaking News session featuring top fintech analysts discussing the latest headlines that everyone at FinovateFall will be talking about. Heading into the lunch break, we’ll showcase another round of demos from companies offering solutions to automate payments, enhance customer communications, fight fraud, and help institutions meet regulatory requirements. The demo sessions after the lunch break will feature a range of innovators demonstrating their solutions for financial advisors building out their wealth management offerings, banks seeking to benefit from advanced payment technologies, and small businesses looking for affordable, flexible financing. The day’s content ends with a keynote address on stablecoins and tokenized deposits and our power panel on the opportunities that agentic AI is bringing to financial institutions featuring panelists from Prudential, University of Michigan Credit Union, and Gradient Labs. Day Two—September 10 The second day of FinovateFall starts with a Finovate favorite: our Analyst All Stars presentations, which borrow our seven-minute format from our demoing companies to present recent research on fintech trends ranging from the relationship between banks and fintechs to AI visibility to adaptive customer onboarding. The morning will also include a special address from Macabacus CEO Charlie Schilling on why trust, not caution, is what unlocks AI’s full value in finance. Our demoing companies return to the stage on Day Two, with technologies that are enabling lenders to streamline mortgage processing, helping advisors boost customer engagement, and bringing voice security solutions to banks and other financial institutions. The day will feature a total of four demo sessions with fintech innovators delivering rapid-fire demonstrations of their solutions for lending and underwriting, fraud prevention and dispute resolution, authentication and identity verification, payments, and more. The final content presentations of the day will include a Special Address from Jawwad Rasheed of Camunda, a Quick Fire Keynote from J.D. Power Senior Director Jennifer White, and a Power Panel on financial crime risk moderated by StrategyBRIX CEO and Managing Partner Jas Randhawa. Our Best of Show awards will be held at the end of the day on Day Two during the drinks and networking reception. Day Three—September 11 With the demos done and Best of Show trophies awarded, Day Three of FinovateFall is all about content: this is true for both our invite-only opportunities such as our Community Bank Spotlight & Breakfast and our IMPACT Funders & Founders event, as well as for our general session and industry stage presentations. In the plenary, FinovateFall attendees will enjoy a pair of special addresses including an out-of-the-box keynote from AI expert Jon Lakefish on AI-enhanced CX to create trust and loyalty. The morning will also feature a Power Panel on the customer experience as a profit engine, moderated by Beyond the Arc’s Steven Ramirez. Following a morning break, it’s time for our industry stages—conferences within the conference that allow for deeper examinations and discussions on topics such as AI & Innovation, Customer Experience & Trust, and The Future of Money. Back in the general session after the lunch break, Day Three of FinovateFall resumes with a pair of Power Panels: one on embedded finance and platform economics and another on bank-fintech partnerships and the transition from competition to collaboration and co-creation. The day concludes with our Fireside Chat on the current US administration and its approach to financial services and fintech regulation, followed by our Investor All-Stars roundtable featuring investors from across the country talking about where the smart money is investing in fintech and why. This is just a quick overview. There’s so much more to FinovateFall this year—from our pre-event exclusives for banks and credit unions on September 8 to our Executive Briefings on Women in Fintech, Community Banking, Embedded Finance, and more. To learn more about everything FinovateFall 2026 has to offer, check out the agenda, now available at our FinovateFall hub. The post FinovateFall 2026 Agenda Revealed! appeared first on Finovate.      Related StoriesFinovateFall 2025: AI, Fraud Prevention, and the Art of What’s PossibleFinovateFall 2025 Best of Show Winners AnnouncedFinovateFall 2025 Sneak Peek Series: Part 9 

Cross River Bank will provide the regulated banking infrastructure behind X Money, X’s new embedded financial services offering. X Money will bring FDIC-insured, interest-bearing accounts, a Visa debit card, and peer-to-peer payment capabilities directly into the social media platform. The launch advances Elon Musk’s “everything app” vision and will test whether US consumers are willing to use a social platform as a primary financial interface. Cross River Bank, a bank and banking-as-a-service (BaaS) provider, announced today that it will power X Money, the financial services capability in X (formerly Twitter). Through the partnership, X will embed FDIC-insured, interest-bearing accounts, a Visa debit card, and broader payment capabilities directly into its social media platform. Cross River will power the financial capabilities through its regulated infrastructure and access to payment rails. “With Cross River providing the banking backbone and X connecting users across the United States, the collaboration represents a new standard for money movement, combining compliance, speed, and scale in a way that meets the needs of today’s digital-first consumers,” the company said in a statement. “By enabling seamless, in-app finance, this will unlock a future where financial services live within the platforms that consumers already use every day.” Founded in 2008, Cross River offers scalable, embedded payments, cards, lending, and crypto solutions to businesses and consumers. The bank is known for its API-driven banking core and regulatory expertise. Because it owns its infrastructure, Cross River eliminates the risk and compliance gaps that come with bringing on third-party systems. X selected Cross River because of its ability to handle payments quickly and at scale, enabling it to support new financial products and features. This follows years of promises from X owner Elon Musk to turn X into “the everything app.” Adding embedded accounts, debit cards, and peer-to-peer payments moves that ambition beyond social media content and into financial services. It also gives X a way to deepen engagement by allowing users to store, spend, and transfer money without leaving the platform. The launch of X Money will be a good test of whether US consumers are ready to treat a social media app as a primary financial interface. If it is successful and its users willingly adopt it as a payments platform, X will have access to valuable transaction data and can create new opportunities around commerce, creator payouts, subscriptions, and other financial products such as lending. It would also put the platform in more direct competition with digital wallets and challenger banks. Cross River’s role is critical because it gives X the regulated banking and payments infrastructure needed to pursue that vision without becoming a bank itself. Photo by SHVETS production The post Cross River to Power Elon Musk’s X Money appeared first on Finovate.       

Agentic wealth platform Goodfin has introduced its Goodfin QSBS Venture Fund. The new offering gives accredited investors access to high-growth startups while taking advantage of Qualified Small Business Stock tax benefits. Expanded as part of the Trump administration’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), QSBS enables eligible holders to exclude up to 100% of federal capital gains on qualifying startup equity. Headquartered in San Francisco and founded in 2022, Goodfin made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2026 in San Diego. Anna Joo Fee is Founder and CEO. Agentic wealth platform Goodfin has announced the launch of its Goodfin QSBS Venture Fund. The new fund is designed to help accredited investors access high-growth startups while optimizing for Qualified Small Business Stock (QSBS) tax benefits. The fund gives investors exposure to venture and Y Combinator-backed companies that have been vetted for IRC Section 1202 / QSBS eligibility, and the opportunity to take advantage of major federal capital gains tax savings. “QSBS is one of the most under-used advantages in venture investing, but also one of the most complex to get right,” Goodfin Founder and CEO Anna Joo Fee said. “Goodfin built this fund to remove that friction.” Intended to encourage investment in small businesses and startups, QSBS are shares in eligible small businesses that qualify for significant federal tax advantages under Section 1202 of the Internal Revenue Code. These benefits include a capital gains tax exclusion of up to 100% when investors sell QSBS. This is a substantial potential savings insofar as long-term capital gains are typically taxed at up to 20%. Factor in the net investment income tax of nearly 4% and the QSBS exclusion can save investors nearly 24% in federal taxes. The QSBS tax incentive has been available to founders, early employees, and investors since 1993. The policy was given a major upgrade last year as part of the Trump administration’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA). This added a new, more flexible tiered exclusion schedule, a higher exclusion cap, and an expansion in the universe of eligible companies to cover more growth-stage startups. These new rules only apply to QSBS issued or acquired after July 4, 2025. The Goodfin QSBS Venture Fund offers a curated portfolio of early-stage startups backed by Tier 1 investors and Y Combinator. Typically at Seed through Series C level, these firms are chosen based on investment merit and are evaluated and verified for Section 1202 eligibility before investment and monitored throughout the duration of the holding. Investors can invest directly through the Goodfin QSBS Venture Fund or roll over current gains from a previous investment, taking advantage of built-in optimization from day one. “The idea behind the fund is simple: the best tax advantage in venture shouldn’t be the one investors and founders discover too late,” Goodfin Head of Memberships and Partnerships Mika Arai wrote on the company blog. “QSBS allows eligible holders to exclude up to 100% of federal capital gains on qualifying startup equity—potentially millions of dollars per investment. Yet it remains one of the most underused benefits in the market, largely because it’s one of the hardest to get right.” What makes it difficult to bring this opportunity to investors? One major factor is that QSBS eligibility has to be both established and maintained during the entire holding period and companies can inadvertently compromise their QSBS status by making otherwise innocuous structuring decisions. Goodfin has teamed up with CapGains, a tax optimization platform, to ensure that every company in the fund is analyzed and vetted for Section 1202 and then monitored throughout its holding period. The new fund is an opportunity for accredited investors to pursue private market returns and secure a targeted tax outcome in a single, professionally-managed investment vehicle. It can also give founders a competitive edge when it comes to fundraising and attracting talent. Investors are becoming increasingly interested in QSBS-eligible companies and because QSBS offers such significant tax advantages at exit, QSBS-eligible companies give investors a tangible reason to invest early. “Whether you’re investing in the next great startup or building one, QSBS can transform your financial outcome—and the post-OBBBA rules make the opportunity larger than it has ever been,” Arai wrote. “The Goodfin QSBS Venture Fund is designed to help you capture the full benefit you can earn, with eligibility verified and monitored from day one.” Founded in 2022 and headquartered in San Francisco, California, Goodfin made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2026 in San Diego. At the conference, the company demonstrated its Goodfin Go solution, which provides sophisticated investors in pre-IPO companies with guided, hyper-personalized, end-to-end investing capabilities. Goodfin Go conducts deep research, portfolio analysis, and real-time investment execution, leveraging a purpose-built agentic orchestration system that uses vetted data sources, multiple AI models, and proprietary insights from the Goodfin platform. Advisor-vetted, Goodfin Go meets the standards of the CFA Level III exam. If you’re interested in pre-IPO companies and promising startups, Finovate’s IMPACT Funders & Founders event is for you. Co-located with FinovateFall, IMPACT serves as a dedicated funding marketplace where breakthrough fintechs meet active investors across the investment spectrum. Photo by micheile henderson on Unsplash The post Goodfin Launches QSBS Venture Fund, Matching Private Market Returns with Tax Savings appeared first on Finovate.       

We’re down to one week left in July, and I have a feeling August will bring a wave of news releases and updates as organizations rush to polish off objectives on their 2026 goal list. For now, here’s a look at the top news headlines for this week. We’ll continue to add more announcements as the week progresses. Lending and collections AKUVO announces 16 new customers in Q2 2026. Open banking Salt Edge invests in Sientia to expand the use of Open Banking for customer engagement. Digital banking Green Dot named a leader in earned wage access by Everest Group. Photo by D R on Unsplash The post Fintech Rundown: A Rapid Review of Weekly News appeared first on Finovate.       

This week’s edition of Finovate Global looks at recent fintech news and developments from Singapore. Ant International Raises $1.2 billion in Series A funding Ant International, the Singapore-based business arm of Chinese fintech giant Ant Group, has secured $1.2 billion in Series A funding. Existing supporters Ant Group and Alibaba Group Holding participated in the equity round along with a number of unnamed international institutional investors. The capital will be used to accelerate Ant International’s global growth plans and fuel continued innovation in a number of areas including merchant payments, account management, and more inclusive financial services for businesses of all sizes. With its main operations in Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and Latin America, Ant International offers a partnership network of banks, card companies, mobile payment firms, and technology platforms that connects 150 million merchants around the world with more than two billion user accounts. Spun off as an independent entity in 2024 and headquartered in Singapore, Ant International operates four main businesses: its digital consumer payments platform, Alipay+; its payment processing technology and infrastructure provider, Antom; its cross-border payments and foreign exchange service for businesses, WorldFirst; and its digital banking and financial services platform, Bettr. The company supports more than 300 payment methods in 220+ markets. This includes 50 mobile payment partners and 10+ national QR code systems. Ant International’s funding news comes as the company announces new partnerships with Freedom Holding Corporation to streamline online shopping from China to customers in Kazakhstan via its Antom division and with QI Tech to expand credit access for e-commerce merchants and consumers in Brazil through its Bettr division. Alipay+ partners with Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Bank Ant International’s payment gateway, Alipay+, has announced a number of new bank partners in recent weeks, adding to its network of more than 50 digital wallets, banks, and financial institutions. The latest firm to team up with Alipay+ is Hong Kong-based Hang Seng Bank. Alipay+’s first banking partner in Hong Kong, Hang Seng Bank will be able to offer users of its mobile app the ability to make payments via QR code scans. The payment option works both in the Chinese mainland as well as overseas at 100+ million merchants in more than 55 countries and regions. “Customers increasingly expect seamless payment solutions when traveling overseas,” Hang Seng Bank Head of Retail Banking and Wealth Rannie Lee said. “By partnering with Alipay+, we’re enhancing customer experience by bringing a simple QR payment service within our mobile app—combining broad merchant acceptance with the simplicity of paying and tracking spending in just one place. This is a strategic step in strengthening our payments proposition and expanding our cross-border connectivity, as we continue to build a digital ecosystem that keeps banking simple, safe, and smart.” Alipay+ empowers banks to offer cross-border payment services via a single integration. The company also works with more than 10 national QR systems, including Malaysia’s DuitNow, Thailand’s PromptPay, and Uzbekistan’s HUMO. This enables banks to scale their mobile payments usage more efficiently instead of having to rely on individual agreements between banks and merchants in multiple markets. The announcement comes at a time when demand for outbound cross-border payments from the Asia Pacific region is expected to increase faster than the international average. Forecasts from FXC Intelligence suggest that this volume could reach $20.1 trillion by 2032, more than double its 2024 levels. A wholly owned subsidiary of the HSBC Group, Hang Seng Bank Limited is a Hong Kong-based banking and financial services company. Founded in 1933, the institution serves nearly four million customers and counts retail banking and wealth management, commercial banking, insurance manufacturing and asset management, and markets and securities services among its core business activities. Singapore and Thailand team up to fight digital fraud The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has inked a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Bank of Thailand (BOT) designed to enhance cooperation in the fight against digital fraud. The pact formalizes and expands on an existing collaboration between MAS and BOT to bolster cybersecurity defenses across their respective financial ecosystems. “Cyber risks and digital fraud are key transnational threats confronting our region and call for closer collaboration to combat these risks,” MAS Managing Director Chia Der Jiun said. The agreement calls for the two regulators to share information on cybersecurity and digital fraud, including changes to cybersecurity regulations and threat intelligence relevant to the financial sector. MAS and BOT will also focus on skill development via joint staff training, research exchanges, and policy discussions. Lastly, the regulators will conduct joint cross-border cybersecurity and crisis management exercises to boost operational readiness. “As cyber threats and digital fraud continue to evolve rapidly amidst growing financial connectivity and technological advancement, closer collaboration between MAS and BOT will help deepen mutual capabilities and achieve seamless cross-border intelligence exchange to counter emerging threats,” BOT Governor Vitai Ratanakorn said. The Memorandum of Understanding was signed during the 31st Executives’ Meeting of East Asia-Pacific Central Banks Governors in Singapore earlier this week. Among the topics discussed were increased uncertainty in the global economy and the impact of AI on the economies and financial systems of countries in East Asia. The governors talked about the potential financial risks from large-scale AI investment, updates on regional developments in AI and digitalization, and the possibility of using AI to enhance the work of central banks. Here is our look at fintech innovation around the world. Central and Eastern Europe Lithuanian identity verification, compliance, and fraud prevention solutions provider iDenfy unveiled its new bank card verification platform. Tech.eu’s Funding Explorer reported a rebound in fintech funding for companies in Germany. UniCredit Poland partnered with Flagright to enhance transaction monitoring, customer screening, and financial crime case management. Middle East and Northern Africa UAE-based KamelPay teamed up with Paymentology to launch its new corporate payments platform for businesses, AbsoluteCard. Turkish fintech Midas announced plans to expand into payment systems. FOO, a B2B fintech solutions provider based in the UAE, partnered with Oman-based Omantel subsidiary, OMPAY, to power its digital wallet. Central and Southern Asia India-based paytech Juspay partners with subscription management and recurring billing platform Recurly. India’s Ministry of Finance outlined a number of measures designed to fortify the country’s fintech industry. Digital bank easypaisa signed a Memorandum of Understanding with blockchain ecosystem Binance to explore fintech opportunities in Pakistan. Latin America and the Caribbean Nubank announced plans to acquire Banco Porto Real de Investimentos. Ábaco, a fintech startup based in San Salvador, El Salvador, raised $53 million in combined venture equity and institutional debt to expand lending to small businesses in Central America Mexican neobank Banco Plata has begun the initial rollout of a network of 300 smart ATMs throughout the country. Asia-Pacific Digital payments and fintech giant Ant International secured $1.2 billion in Series A funding. Alipay+ partnered with Hang Seng Bank to enable QR code payments in Hong Kong. Visa and AI-native financial infrastructure provider Lianlian DigiTech launched China’s first B2B agentic transaction. Sub-Saharan Africa South African remittance fintech eZi Remit teamed up with Mastercard to enhance cross-border money transfer services. Nigerian fintech Moniepoint announced new Kenya CEO Rose Muturi. African fintech Zazu secured strategic backing from pan-African venture capital firm Launch Africa Ventures. Photo by Jurgen Lasa from Pexels The post Finovate Global Singapore: Funding a Unicorn, Partnering on Payments, and Fighting Digital Fraud appeared first on Finovate.