SoFi has launched SoFiUSD, a fully reserved US dollar token issued by SoFi Bank, positioning itself as a stablecoin infrastructure provider for banks, fintechs, and enterprises seeking faster, always-on settlement. Although branded as a stablecoin, SoFiUSD’s cash-only backing and on-demand redemption model place it closer to a tokenized bank deposit. SoFi’s approach aligns more closely with JPMorgan’s JPM Coin than with non-bank stablecoins like KlarnaUSD, underscoring a growing divide between bank-issued tokenized deposits and fintech-issued stablecoins as programmable money adoption grows. Lending and wealth management fintech SoFi is entering the stablecoin market today. The San Francisco-based lending and wealth management company has launched SoFiUSD, a fully reserved US dollar token issued by SoFi Bank. The new tool blurs the line between a traditional stablecoin and a tokenized bank deposit. The distinction between these two terms matters, as banks and fintechs are increasingly taking different approaches to bringing regulated money onto blockchain rails. SoFiUSD will allow SoFi, an OCC-regulated insured depository institution, to serve as a stablecoin infrastructure provider for banks, fintechs, and enterprise platforms with an aim to streamline operations with the faster and more efficient money movement that stablecoins offer. SoFi’s new stablecoin will enable partners to leverage SoFi’s framework to issue white-labeled stablecoins or integrate SoFiUSD into their own settlement flows. SoFiUSD will be used for: Settling SoFi’s crypto trading business Offering third parties such as card networks, retailers, or businesses faster, safer settlement 24/7 Powering SoFi Pay for international remittances and point-of-sale purchases Serving as an alternative form of payment for Galileo’s partners Acting as a secured dollar-denominated asset for companies operating in countries with volatile currencies “Blockchain is a technology super cycle that will fundamentally change finance, not just in payments, but across every area of money,” said SoFi CEO Anthony Noto. “With SoFiUSD, we’re using the infrastructure we’ve built over the last decade and applying it to real-world challenges in financial services. Companies today struggle with slow settlement, fragmented providers, and unverified reserve models. SoFi is helping address these gaps by combining our regulatory strength as a national bank with transparent, fully reserved on-chain technology to provide a safer and more efficient way for partners to move funds.” While SoFi is calling SoFiUSD a stablecoin, its reserve model acts more like a tokenized deposit. That’s because the token is fully backed by cash held at SoFi Bank and redeemable on demand, representing bank deposits on-chain. This structure removes liquidity and credit risk and positions SoFiUSD as regulated bank money rather than a crypto instrument. SoFi may be using the term “stablecoin” for three reasons. The first is market familiarity, as the term “stablecoin” is more widely recognized than tokenized deposits. The second is regulatory ambiguity, since US regulators have yet to formally define how tokenized deposits should be treated. The third is interoperability, with “stablecoin” indicating compatibility with today’s on-chain payment rails. By launching what is effectively a tokenized deposit, SoFi joins a small but growing group of regulated banks experimenting with blockchain-based bank money, most notably JPMorgan Chase, which launched JPM Coin in November. Like JPM Coin, SoFiUSD keeps reserves inside the banking system and uses on-chain rails to modernize settlement rather than to create a parallel form of money. The tokenized deposits approach stands in contrast to KlarnaUSD, Klarna’s recently announced stablecoin, which is issued by a non-bank and backed by reserves held outside the issuer’s balance sheet. While KlarnaUSD is designed to improve payments efficiency for cross-border commerce, SoFiUSD’s approach leverages a bank charter to embed stablecoins directly into deposits, lending, and treasury workflows. As banks and fintechs experiment with programmable money, the distinction between bank-issued tokenized deposits and non-bank stablecoins may prove critical in determining which models scale beyond payments into the core of financial services. Photo by Dawid Sokołowski on Unsplash The post SoFi Launches SoFiUSD Stablecoin, But Could it Actually be a Tokenized Deposit? appeared first on Finovate.       

Businesses today are confronted with a dizzying array of options when it comes to digital modernization and embracing technological innovation. Decision-making when it comes to technology investment is often slow, and the costs incurred when those investments do not work out as planned can be painfully high. Poor solution choices have resulted in failure rates of up to 75%, according to some estimates, and even those investments that do succeed often come with hefty price tags that can put a drag on revenues. To learn what companies in the financial services space can do to make better technology choices, I caught up with Charlie Day, SVP, Sales and Advisory, at UPSTACK, at FinovateFall 2025 earlier this year. UPSTACK is a technology advisory platform that helps businesses reduce costs, accelerate deployment, and simplify IT decision-making. The company offers vendor-agnostic expertise, with recommendations powered by both AI and UPSTACK’s vendor experience, all informed by the firm’s proprietary dataset. In this conversation, Day explains how UPSTACK combines a focus on long-term relationships, human expertise, and AI-powered insights to drive business success and help companies achieve their goals in an ever-evolving technology landscape. Technological advisory has really shifted into more of a strategic relationship. It’s not just about a transaction, an event, or a sale, but a true, long-term relationship beyond the technology choice. We mix the technology expertise we have with marketing insights—everything from pricing to integration capabilities to how certain selections will mix into their overall IT landscape—to ensure that our customers are making not only the right decision in a short snapshot in time, but also what’s going to keep them achieving their goals over the long term. Charlie Day brings more than 20 years of experience in enterprise sales and strategic partnerships. He has held leadership roles at 8×8, RingCentral, Oracle, and AT&T. Day has business degrees from the University of New Hampshire and Southern New Hampshire University. UPSTACK is a vendor-neutral, full-service technology brokerage. Founded in 2017 and headquartered in New York City, the company provides expert advisory and execution services to help businesses make smarter technology decisions. UPSTACK works with companies across the entire technology landscape, including colocation, cloud, connectivity, networking, cybersecurity, AI, and more. With more than 60 customers in the Fortune 1000, UPSTACK recently acquired Breakwater Cloud Advisors, a CX consultancy specializing in contact center modernization, automation, and AI transformation. Christopher Trapp is UPSTACK’s Founder and CEO. Photo by Sonja Langford on Unsplash The post UPSTACK on Empowering Businesses with Strategic Tech Advisory and Innovation appeared first on Finovate.       

Tyro Payments will acquire Australian financial management platform for SMEs, Thriday. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. The acquisition will expand Tyro’s banking and payments capabilities, and accelerate delivery of the company’s integrated, cash-flow management solutions. Founded in 2003 and headquartered in Sydney, Australia, Tyro made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2017. Australia-based fintech Tyro Payments has agreed to acquire SME financial management platform Thriday. Terms of the deal were not immediately available. Tyro said in its statement that the acquisition is part of its strategy to grow its banking and payments capabilities. The transaction will also enable Tyro to accelerate the delivery of integrated, all-in-one cash flow management solutions for its customers. “Combining Thriday’s smart automation and financial tools with Tyro’s payments and banking capabilities will deliver a more complete and powerful solution for our customers and a platform for further software-driven innovation,” Tyro CFO and Acting CEO Emma Burke said. “We see the acquisition of Thriday as a great win for our business and our customers, and we will continue to pursue M&A opportunities that are aligned with our growth strategy.” The acquisition is expected to be completed in January 2026, and is subject to customary conditions. The majority of Thriday’s team, including CEO Michael Nuciforo, is expected to join Tyro. Based in Melbourne, Australia, Thriday offers an integrated banking, accounting, tax, and invoicing solution that serves as a financial operating system for small businesses. The company’s technology automates and streamlines multiple financial administrative tasks for these companies, helping them save time and boost productivity. “We are excited to join Tyro, a company that shares our commitment to innovation and customer-focused product design,” Thriday’s Nuciforo said. “We look forward to helping Tyro accelerate the delivery of customer solutions that help Australian businesses run smarter and grow faster.” Tyro made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2017. Founded in 2003 and headquartered in Sydney, Australia, the company provides in-store, online, and on-the-go payment solutions for more than 76,000 merchants throughout Australia. With more than 450 POS partners, Tyro delivers integrated banking and lending solutions to companies in verticals including retail, services, hospitality, and healthcare. Tyro’s acquisition news follows the company’s November announcement that Nigel Lee, a fintech veteran with more than 25 years of leadership experience, will take over as Chief Executive Officer in January 2025. Lee will replace outgoing CEO Jon Davey. “I am passionate about the payments industry and have followed Tyro’s story since it was founded in 2003,” Lee said in a statement. “It is exciting to return to Australia to lead one of the country’s most innovative fintechs into its next chapter.” Photo by Kevan Lin on Unsplash The post Tyro Acquires SME Financial Management Platform Thriday appeared first on Finovate.       

Finovate Best of Show winner 10x Banking has partnered with audax Financial Technology to accelerate digital banking modernization with banks throughout Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. The partnership will help banks modernize their core operations quickly, but incrementally, keeping technology debt low as they pursue new business models such as Banking-as-a-Service and super apps. Founded in 2016, 10x Banking is headquartered in London, UK. Antony Jenkins is Founder, Chair, and CEO, 10x Banking, which won Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2023, has teamed up with audax Financial Technology to bring digital banking modernization to core banking service providers throughout Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. While speed is the headline, deploying systems that are capable of keeping up with the rapid growth of the digital payment and fintech markets is just as important. “This partnership shows banks don’t need to choose between speed and resilience; they can have both,” 10x Banking Founder and CEO Antony Jenkins said. “By combining 10x Banking’s modern core with audax’s digital agility, banks in high-growth regions can innovate at pace, minimize risk, and deliver lasting customer value.” In the partnership announcement, 10x Banking underscored research that indicated that a growing number of banks perceive the failure to modernize their core systems as an “existential risk.” In the APAC region, research indicated that 67% of banking executives believed they were falling behind in terms of digital modernization, a sentiment supported by the fact that only 8% reported that they had prioritized core banking at their institutions. Together, 10x Banking and audax, a banking technology solutions provider supported by Standard Chartered, will empower banks to launch new digital products and services faster than is possible with their current legacy core systems. audax’s expertise in enabling modern banking systems, combined with 10x Banking’s meta core platform capable of processing more than a billion real-time transactions annually, will enable banks to modernize incrementally. This will help them keep overall technical debt low while still reaching new customer segments and launching new business models, ranging from Banking-as-a-Service to super apps. “Traditional core banking projects take years and cost tens of millions,” audax CEO Kelvin Tan said. “Our partnership with 10x Banking changes that equation entirely. Banks can launch full digital services in as fast as six months for a fraction of the cost. That’s the difference between a digital banking project that only works for major cities versus one that can also reach underserved markets across the regions we serve.” Singapore-based audax offers a plug-and-play digital banking platform that enables banks to quickly launch scalable, compliant solutions—from Banking-as-a-Service to new digital banks. Founded in 2023, audax includes Standard Chartered and Maybank Islamic among its customers. Headquartered in London, UK, 10x Banking was founded in 2016. A B Corp-certified core banking platform, 10x Banking handles six billion API calls a month and generates more than three million statements an hour for global institutions. Photo by Corporate Locations on Unsplash The post 10x Banking Accelerates Digital Banking Modernization with audax appeared first on Finovate.       

Visa has launched USDC stablecoin settlement in the US, enabling issuers and acquirers to settle transactions in Circle’s dollar-denominated stablecoin using blockchain infrastructure. Cross River Bank and Lead Bank are piloting the capability to deliver faster, always-on settlement and improved treasury efficiency while remaining compatible with existing payment rails. The move signals stablecoins’ shift from experimentation to bank-ready infrastructure. Visa unveiled today that it has launched stablecoin settlement in the United States. The payments giant is partnering with Circle’s USDC dollar-denominated stablecoin to enable US issuers and acquirers to settle with Visa in USDC. USDC settlement relies on blockchains to offer issuers faster money movement and seven‑day settlement windows that will improve both speed and liquidity, modernized treasury management with automated treasury operations, and interoperability between traditional payment rails and blockchain-based payments. “Visa is expanding stablecoin settlement because our banking partners are not only asking about it— they’re preparing to use it,” said Visa’s Global Head of Growth Products and Strategic Partnerships Rubail Birwadker. “Financial institutions are looking for faster, programmable settlement options that integrate seamlessly with their existing treasury operations. By bringing USDC settlement to the US, Visa is delivering a reliable, bank‑ready capability that improves treasury efficiency while maintaining the security, compliance, and resiliency standards our network requires.” Piloting the launch are Cross River Bank and Lead Bank, which are leveraging the Solana blockchain to settle with Visa in USDC. Visa is planning broader availability in the US in 2026. Cross River Bank, a leading infrastructure provider that offers embedded financial solutions, reinforces the importance of true interoperability. “Fintech and crypto innovators increasingly ask us to bring stablecoins into their existing product suite,” said Gilles Gade, Founder, President and CEO of Cross River. “A unified platform that natively supports both stablecoins and traditional payment networks is the foundation for how value will move globally. As one of the first US banks to enable USDC settlement with Visa, we’re demonstrating how a tech-forward, deeply integrated banking partner can connect blockchain networks and legacy systems at scale.” Today’s announcement comes the same week that Visa Consulting & Analytics launched its Stablecoins Advisory Practice to offer education and guidance on market fit and implementation. VyStar Credit Union and Pathward are early participants in the program, which they will use to find new opportunities in the $250 billion stablecoin market. Visa, which became one of the first major payment networks to settle in stablecoins in 2023, has been positioning itself at the forefront of the stablecoin revolution. Last month, the company’s monthly stablecoin settlement volume passed a $3.5 billion annualized run rate threashold. Visa’s move to bring USDC settlement to the US shows that the early momentum in stablecoin activity this year is set to continue into next year as the payment rail moves from experimental to a bank-ready settlement tool. By embedding stablecoin settlement directly into its network, Visa is making programmable, always-on settlement a practical option for traditional banks seeking to improve liquidity management, shorten settlement cycles, and bridge existing payment rails with blockchain infrastructure. Photo by Jonathan Borba The post Visa Launches USDC Settlement in the US appeared first on Finovate.       

As interest in digital assets and decentralized finance grows among both retail and institutional users, offering a platform that caters to both communities is a major point of differentiation for companies in the DeFi space. Further, companies that provide services that bridge the gap between traditional finance (TradFi) and decentralized finance will be best positioned to serve those retail and institutional users who increasingly need to efficiently manage both traditional and digital assets. This context helps understand two recent announcements from digital asset platform Coinbase. First, this week, the company announced that it had selected Chainlink CCIP as the exclusive bridging solution for its Coinbase Wrapped Assets. “We chose Chainlink because they are an industry leader for cross-chain connectivity,” Coinbase Senior Director, Product Management, Josh Leavitt said. “Their infrastructure provides a reliable means to expand Coinbase Wrapped Asset offerings.” A leading oracle platform, Chainlink connects blockchain-based smart contracts with real-world, external data, events, and systems. Integrated with numerous blockchains—including Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain, Avalanche, and more—Chainlink powers thousands of decentralized applications and protocols across DeFi, NFT, and enterprise use cases. The company’s CCIP leverages the same decentralized oracle networks that secure more than 70% of DeFi around the world, and has enabled more than $27 trillion in transaction volume. Coinbase Wrapped Assets are tokenized versions of cryptocurrencies issued and managed by Coinbase. A 1:1 equivalent of the underlying digital asset, Coinbase Wrapped Assets are built to operate on a blockchain other than its native blockchain. For example, a Coinbase Wrapped Bitcoin can be used on a blockchain, such as Ethereum, that does not natively support Bitcoin. Coinbase Wrapped Assets include cbBTC, cbETH, cbDOGE, cbLTC, cbADA, and cbXRP. Combined, they have a market capitalization of $7 billion. In partnering with Chainlink, Coinbase will use Chainlink CCIP to provide a foundation for bridging Coinbase Wrapped Assets across and beyond ecosystems. “CCIP was selected by Coinbase for their cross-chain needs due to CCIP’s security and reliability,” Chainlink Head of Strategic Initiatives William Reilly said. “As the leading publicly-listed firm for digital assets, Coinbase takes security and reliability for their products seriously. I am excited about accelerating the growth of Coinbase’s wrapped assets and look forward to helping bring global finance onchain.” Coinbase’s partnership announcement with Chainlink comes just days after the company reported that it was expanding its institutional collaboration on digital assets with international banking group Standard Chartered. “By leveraging Standard Chartered’s global banking expertise and Coinbase’s leadership in the digital asset space, we are creating a secure and seamless framework for institutions to access and manage digital assets with confidence,” Coinbase Institutional Co-CEO Brett Tejpaul said. “Together, we are driving the evolution of the financial ecosystem and enabling institutions to unlock new opportunities in this rapidly growing market.” The partnership builds on an existing relationship between the two firms in which Standard Chartered provides banking connectivity to facilitate real-time SGD transfers for Coinbase customers. Standard Chartered has a reputation as a “pro-crypto” financial institution that was among the first major global banks to offer deliverable crypto trading for institutional clients. In addition to its collaboration with Coinbase, the bank has also partnered with crypto platform Crypto.com to enable users in 90+ countries to deposit and withdraw in major currencies through Crypto.com’s app. Founded in 2012, Coinbase made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2014. Today, the company has $516 billion in assets on its platform and facilitates $295 billion in quarterly trading volume. Co-Founder Brian Armstrong is Chief Executive Officer. Coinbase also recently published its State of Crypto Q4 2025 report: “Younger investors are rewriting the investing playbook.” The cross-generational report surveyed 4,350 US adults, including 2,005 with investment accounts, on their thoughts about the financial markets and what role digital assets played in their own investing strategies. Photo by Tim Umphreys on Unsplash The post Coinbase Bridges TradFi, DeFi Gap; Empowers Retail, Institutional Clients appeared first on Finovate.       

Last year’s FinovateEurope conference brought together fintech creators from around the world. At the event, our audience voted for three standout companies that took home Best of Show honors for their demos. Almost a year out from FinovateEurope 2025, and with FinovateEurope 2026 coming up on February 10 and 11, we’re taking a look at how last year’s three Best of Show winners in innovation have continued to grow, influence their markets, and shape the future of financial services technology. Keyless At FinovateEurope 2025, Keyless showcased its privacy-preserving biometric authentication solution that replaces traditional, multi-factor authentication with fast, passwordless identity verification using zero-knowledge biometrics. Nine months later, the company agreed to be acquired by identity and access management company Ping Identity. Keyless’s biometric authentication technology will be integrated into Ping Identity’s platform to expand adoption of secure, privacy-first login experiences across enterprise environments. This acquisition not only validates Keyless’s technology but it also demonstrates the importance of seamless, secure authentication. R34DY & ABLEMENTS Hungarian fintech R34DY and its ABLEMENTS integration platform won Best of Show in London thanks to its solution that aims to simplify complex integrations between legacy core systems and modern microservices architectures. Since its FinovateEurope demo, R34DY has continued to build on both its product and presence. The company added four main modules to ABLEMENTS, each addressing critical needs in context engineering; completed eight proofs of concept, demonstrating real-world value; and found six flagship use cases for the product, demonstrating diverse applications of the solution. Overall, R34DY’s platform has attracted attention for its ability to bring context-aware automation and faster time-to-market for banks and fintechs seeking to modernize complex workflows. Tweezr Tweezr took Best of Show honors at FinovateEurope 2025 for its AI-powered developer assistant, a tool built to help teams accelerate time-to-market while navigating legacy code and modernization efforts. Over the past year, Tweezr has continued to refine and expand its platform to help organizations address the notorious difficulty of maintaining and modernizing mission-critical systems without sacrificing stability or productivity. Having been founded in mid-2024, Tweezr is still early in its growth journey, but its tools will be increasingly relevant as firms navigate the intersection of AI solutions and legacy systems. Looking Ahead: FinovateEurope 2026 While these winners are just a snapshot of the new technologies available in fintech today, they show how the Finovate stage can serve as a springboard to real-world traction, strategic partnerships, and industry recognition. Join us February 10 through 11 in London for FinovateEurope 2026 to see the next wave of fintech demos first-hand and learn how they will shape the future of financial services. Whether you’re a founder, builder, investor, or enterprise leader, the opportunity to meet, connect, and collaborate with tomorrow’s fintech leaders awaits. Photo by Philippe BONTEMPS on Unsplash The post Where Are They Now? Highlights from FinovateEurope 2025 Best of Show Winners appeared first on Finovate.       

Making headlines this December morning is the launch of Sam Altman’s World, a self-proclaimed “super app” that offers crypto payments and encrypted chat functionality. Check out other fintech headlines as they break throughout the week below. We’ll continue to add more announcements as the week progresses. Security, fraud, and identity HSBC selects ValidiFI to power next-generation bank account validation and fraud monitoring. Core banking and digital transformation British Caribbean Bank goes live with Finastra Essence to transform core banking. Capital Bank advances digital transformation with Diebold Nixdorf’s multivendor self-service software. Payments YouTube launches option for US creators to receive stablecoin payouts through PayPal. Maxio launches Maxio MCP to accelerate AI-forward finance with governed access to billing and revenue data. AI Arcesium unveils new suite of AI features in Aquata to help institutional investors scale their AI strategies. Crypto Sam Altman’s World launches its “super app” that includes crypto pay and encrypted chat features. Photo by Cristina Glebova on Unsplash The post Fintech Rundown: A Rapid Review of Weekly News appeared first on Finovate.       

Mollie plans to acquire GoCardless in a move that creates a unified European payments platform that combines card payments, bank-to-bank transfers, and local payment methods for more than 350,000 businesses. GoCardless strengthens Mollie’s recurring payments and open banking capabilities, helping merchants reduce failed payments, customer churn, and cross-border complexity. The deal reflects a broader shift in payments, as merchants increasingly favor full-stack platforms that integrate payments, fraud, financing, and analytics while making bank payments and open banking rails core infrastructure rather than optional add-ons. Payments platform Mollie unveiled this week that it plans to acquire business payments platform GoCardless. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Combined, the two providers will serve over 350,000 businesses with a holistic solution that offers card payments, local payment methods, and bank payments into a single solution.   “We’re incredibly excited to join forces with Mollie,” said GoCardless Co-Founder and CEO Hiroki Takeuchi. “This deal brings together two highly complementary businesses that have built best-in-class products across Europe and beyond.  By combining our expertise in card, bank and hyperlocal payments into one provider, we can better serve our customers, accelerate growth and raise the bar for the industry. It’s a win for European fintech and we’re confident that the new company will be greater than the sum of its parts.” GoCardless, which won Best Enterprise Payments Solution at the 2021 Finovate Awards, was founded in 2011. The UK-based company’s technology helps merchants collect recurring and one-off payments from customers via ACH transfers. GoCardless’ APIs help businesses automate payment collection and reconciliation billing for subscription and invoice payments. Last year, the company acquired NuPay, which helped expand GoCardless’ services through partners and intermediaries, including Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) and Payment Service Providers (PSPs).  Mollie’s platform powers online and in-person payments, reconciliation, fraud prevention, and working capital loans with flexible repayment options across 30+ European markets and the UK. Founded in 2004, Mollie has raised $928 million. “Mollie’s mission has always been to make money management effortless,” said Mollie CEO Koen Köppen. “We were founded on the vision to eliminate financial bureaucracy for every business. We see that bureaucracy creates challenges, especially for businesses with recurring revenue. A card-only approach has its limits, leading to high costs due to failed payments and customer churn. GoCardless built the definitive solution to optimize this process with its global bank payment network. By bringing them into Mollie, we take a huge step towards fulfilling our vision and creating one complete platform for sustainable growth.” Mollie anticipates that the deal will give businesses access to a broad suite of tools that will offer financing, fraud monitoring, and analytics from a single place. The integration will also allow Mollie to offer recurring revenue management, more options for SaaS and vertical software vendors, local onboarding and reporting, and an easier on-ramp to international expansion. Mollie’s acquisition of GoCardless marks a major consolidation in Europe’s payments landscape as unified platforms that combine cards, bank payments, and hyper-local payment options become more popular. As card failure rates, churn, and cross-border complexity continue to challenge merchants, Mollie is positioning itself as a full-stack alternative to fragmented payment tooling. The added capabilities offer merchants fewer integrations, stronger recurring revenue management, and a single provider for payments, fraud, financing, and analytics across Europe and the UK. The move also shows that bank-to-bank payments and open banking rails are becoming a core necessity for high-growth digital businesses. The deal is expected to close by mid-2026. Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko The post Business Payments Unite: Mollie to Acquire GoCardless appeared first on Finovate.       

Enova is acquiring Grasshopper Bank for $369 million, creating a full-stack digital financial services provider that blends online lending with modern API-driven banking. Grasshopper brings $1.4 billion in assets, $3 billion in deposits, and a growing sponsor-bank portfolio, strengthening Enova’s infrastructure, deposit base, and fintech capabilities. The deal show the benefits of digital lenders that move up-market by acquiring bank charters to stabilize funding, expand product suites, and compete in the next phase of fintech. It may be mid-December, but that doesn’t mean it’s too late to announce a bank acquisition. Online financial services company Enova International revealed that Grasshopper Bancorp has agreed to be acquired in a cash and stock transaction valued at approximately $369 million. Grasshopper Bank, which offers small business banking and lending tools, as well as embedded finance and BaaS, was founded in 2019 and currently holds more than $1.4 billion in total assets as of September 2025. In addition to small business banking, the digital-first bank focuses on startup banking, venture and tech-forward SMB tools, digital treasury management, and high yield business checking and savings products. Grasshopper Bank is also a sponsor bank, working with fintechs such as Pocketbook, Manifest, and Sydecar. The bank, through its direct banking and BaaS product offerings, holds $3 billion in total deposits. “We’re thrilled to join forces with Enova, a market leader in digital lending and a true innovator in the use of technology and analytics in the financial services sector,” said Grasshopper CEO Mike Butler. “This combination of enhanced digital lending and banking will enable us to serve an even broader set of customers while expanding and strengthening the product offerings for our current clients.” Enova anticipates that this transaction will combine its consumer and small business online lending capabilities with Grasshopper’s digital banking infrastructure to help it become a stronger, more diversified financial services provider. With more than 13 million customers, Enova’s portfolio has seven brands, including OnDeck, Headway Capital, The Business Backer, CashNetUSA, NetCredit, Simplic, and Pangea. “Acquiring and partnering with Grasshopper creates a powerful digital bank that positions us to offer a more comprehensive suite of financial solutions across more states to empower consumers and small businesses with the products they need to succeed,” said Enova Chairman and CEO David Fisher. “Our complementary capabilities and shared customer-first mindset mean we can grow and innovate faster, together. We’re excited to welcome the Grasshopper team to Enova.” Once the deal is finalized, Enova will be formed as a bank holding company with Grasshopper Bank as its subsidiary. Butler will stay on as President of Grasshopper Bank, reporting to Steve Cunningham, who will be appointed CEO of Grasshopper Bank and will assume the role of Enova CEO on January 1, 2026. The deal creates a vertically integrated fintech–bank hybrid that combines Enova’s scale in online consumer and SMB lending with Grasshopper’s modern, API-driven banking infrastructure, giving Enova a foothold in embedded finance. The announcement also offers a clue of how digital lenders and digital banks are converging to compete in the next phase of financial services. We may see other digital lenders move up-market by acquiring bank charters to stabilize funding and expand their product sets. Photo by Roberto Carlos Blanc Angulo The post Enova to Acquire Grasshopper Bank for $369 Million appeared first on Finovate.       

Financial institutions are entering a new phase of AI maturity, a new era that will be defined by scale, governance, and measurable outcomes. As banks double down on their investment in advanced analytics and machine learning, they will face a challenge of leveraging these new enabling technologies responsibly, securely, and consistently. At FinovateFall earlier this year, Stacy Bishop, Founder of amBaaSsador, sat down with Aditya Mehra, Senior Architect of Machine Learning at Bank of America, to explore how one of the world’s largest financial institutions is structuring its AI strategy for longevity, resiliency, and trust. Aditya Mehra brings a systems-architect mindset to Bank of America’s AI evolution. With deep experience in building machine learning platforms, Mehra emphasizes the importance of designing for repeatability and trust from day one. With a “be good, do good” mentality, his focus is on reducing friction for practitioners while ensuring that every model deployed by the bank meets strict thresholds for performance, fairness, explainability, and compliance. With millions of daily users, globally distributed operations, and a deep dataset, Bank of America views machine learning as a critical enabler across fraud prevention, customer experience, risk management, and operational efficiency. By investing in a unified ML platform and prioritizing responsible AI principles, Bank of America is building an ecosystem that supports innovation at scale while upholding the trust of its customers and regulators. Photo by Yan Krukau The post Bank of America’s AI Blueprint: How Aditya Mehra Is Shaping Responsible Machine Learning appeared first on Finovate.       

Today’s financial landscape is steered by rising consumer expectations, requiring banks to search for ways to deliver more personalized, actionable guidance to their customers. While fintech has always discussed financial wellness, it is not always easy to deliver it in a way that is embedded, intuitive, and with low friction. The banks that will take the lead in the customer journey in 2026 are the ones that will turn complex financial decisions into simple, interactive experiences that help users understand their options in real time. Today, we’re highlighting a conversation with Chase Neinken, CRO and co-founder of Chimney, which offers banks personalized tools to help them improve the customer experience and ultimately improve their financial wellness. Recorded at FinovateFall 2025, this interview features Neinken’s thoughts on how banks can use interactive tools to deepen engagement, increase transparency, and empower consumers to make smarter financial decisions within their trusted banking channels. But I think over the next few years, what you’re going to see, especially with AI and automation and some of the intelligence tools that are coming out, is that the winners are going to separate themselves by moving from the application layer to the infrastructure layer. So owning that data and being able and prepared to take advantage and act on it. So [consider] how you take advantage of all of the accountholder data that you have within your existing systems, not relying on third parties to do that, and then analyze that data, act on that data, and give that to the accountholders in a very convenient experience that helps your teams be more efficient and helps you grow the balance sheet in a meaningful way. As a co-founder of Chimney, Chase Neinken brings a commercial mindset shaped by years of working with banks and fintechs to solve real consumer pain points. Neinken’s focus is on transforming static, outdated digital banking experiences into dynamic tools that guide users toward financial wellness. Founded in 2021, Chimney is helping banks change the role they play in consumers’ financial lives by providing interactive financial tools that power more personalized, data-driven experiences within the banks’ existing channels. Chimney’s tools help users explore scenarios such as mortgage affordability and home-equity planning. For financial institutions, the New York-based company offers a plug-and-play way to increase engagement, build trust, and drive conversions without overhauling their core. Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya The post Chimney’s Blueprint for Financial Wellness: How Chase Neinken Is Reimagining the Digital Banking Experience appeared first on Finovate.       

Brex and Fifth Third Bank have entered a multiyear partnership that uses Brex Embedded to power the bank’s new commercial card, bringing modern spend management and AI-driven automation to Fifth Third’s commercial clients. The integration gives businesses access to Brex’s finance platform, enabling real-time payments, automated expense workflows, corporate card issuance, and AI agents that streamline closing the books and controlling spend. The partnership is strategically significant for both sides. It expands Brex’s reach into established commercial banking while helping Fifth Third differentiate itself with an AI-powered alternative to legacy expense management tools. Corporate card and expense management fintech Brex announced a new partnership with Fifth Third Bank this week. In the multiyear agreement, Fifth Third will leverage Brex Embedded, Brex’s API-driven payments infrastructure to power the Fifth Third Commercial Card. Through the integration, Fifth Third’s commercial clients will gain access to Brex’s finance software platform that will enable them to issue corporate cards, automate expense management, and make secure, real-time payments. Customers can also use Brex’s AI agents that automate complex workflows to close the books faster, reduce manual review, and control spending. “The future of business demands financial platforms that do more than process payments—they must power growth,” said Fifth Third Chairman, CEO, and President Tim Spence. “Our partnership with Brex is a commitment to redefine how companies leverage financial technology. By combining the strength of a leading bank with Brex’s AI-driven innovation, we’re creating intelligent solutions that simplify complexity, drive efficiency, and enable businesses to scale globally with confidence.” For a long-standing, traditional financial institution like Fifth Third, this partnership will bring modern, AI-powered technology into its commercial banking business. The new commercial card will become the default commercial card solution for the bank’s commercial clients. “This partnership changes everything. By combining Fifth Third Bank’s financial strength with Brex’s AI-driven technology, we’re delivering an intelligent platform that automates workflows, enhances visibility and eliminates manual processes,” said Fifth Third’s Head of Commercial Payments Bridgit Chayt. “Businesses gain real-time insights, global scalability and finance tools that work proactively on their behalf—freeing teams to focus on strategy, not spreadsheets. We’re introducing a new standard for speed, accuracy and control in commercial finance.” Brex was founded in 2017 to create a digital-first business banking solution. The company offers business bank accounts with credit cards that have built-in rewards, spend controls, and expense tracking. The accounts provide businesses access to their online revenue, billpay tools, and integration with popular accounting tools. Brex quickly rose to prominence in the fintech space after positioning itself as a digital bank account and card offering for startups. The company sought to solve pain points that often come with corporate cards, including lengthy approval processes and restrictive credit limits. Within just two years, Brex managed to raise billions of dollars in funding and achieve unicorn status. In 2022, however, as Brex sought to expand its client base from small businesses to larger, venture-backed firms, the company experienced a downward shift. In pivoting toward this target market, Brex discontinued some of its services geared toward small businesses, many of which were the fintech’s original customers. This pivot required some of Brex’s original small business clients to leave to seek alternative solutions. Despite the dip, Brex remains a major player in the fintech space, serving “tens of thousands of businesses” ranging from small private companies to large public brands, including Airbnb and ClassPass. For Brex, the partnership is strategically significant. After years of repositioning toward larger, venture-backed firms, embedding its technology inside a major US bank gives the company a new distribution channel and a path to reach established commercial clients. For Fifth Third, the partnership serves as a differentiating factor from peers that still rely on dated expense management tools and manual workflows. Overall, the partnership raises expectations across the commercial banking category. Photo by Karola G The post Fifth Third Bank Embeds Brex’s Payments Infrastructure appeared first on Finovate.       

FinovateEurope returns to London on March 10 through 11, 2026. Taking place at the O2 Intercontinental in London, the event brings together 1,000+ senior-level attendees (including an impressive 600+ from banks and other financial institutions), decision-makers, investors, and creators shaping the future of financial services. If your organization is building technology that can transform banking, payments, wealth management, fraud prevention, or the broader digital finance ecosystem, now is the time to put it in front of the industry’s most powerful audience. For more than 15 years, Finovate’s demo format has earned its reputation as the launchpad for the next generation of fintech solutions. No slides. No long pitches. Just seven minutes to show the world what your technology can do. It’s fast, high-impact, and built specifically to elevate companies that are ready for growth. Why demo? Visibility, credibility, and real business outcomes FinovateEurope is attended by senior leaders from top banks, tier-one investors, and global fintech brands looking for the ideas, partnerships, and capabilities that will define the next wave of financial innovation. Demos routinely lead to commercial deals, strategic investments, media exposure, and accelerated market traction. Whether you are an early-stage startup seeking your breakthrough moment or an established provider launching your latest product, Finovate offers unmatched visibility. Experience the Finovate effect Previous demoing companies have leveraged the stage to enter new markets, secure funding, and close deals with some of Europe’s largest financial institutions. Past participants are now among the top names making waves in fintech. Here’s what some of our alumni demo companies have been up to recently: Locking in capital LeapXpert kicked off the year by raising $20 million in Series B funding to revolutionize business communications. FISPAN followed suit midyear, securing $30 million in Series B funding to expand its embedded ERP banking solutions. Scalable Capital made headlines with a record-breaking €155 million funding round to enhance its digital wealth management and investing platform. Forging big bank partnerships Taulia partnered with Lloyds in Q1 to issue Visa-enabled virtual cards for SAP Business Suite solutions. Personetics joined forces with KeyBank in Q2 to deliver personalized financial insights to customers. Wio Bank PJSC and Xero teamed up in Q3 to simplify accounting operations for SMEs in the UAE. Leading fintech innovation News heated up in June when Fiserv announced plans to launch its own stablecoin, FIUSD, further advancing the payments landscape. By July, AutoRek unveiled a new platform to streamline data management and reconciliation for cryptocurrency and digital assets. And fintech pioneer PayPal unveiled PayPal World, a new platform connecting global payment systems and digital wallets. Be part of fintech’s next big moment Applications to demo at FinovateEurope 2026 are now open. The earlier you submit, the more visibility you’ll have with our selection committee and also the fintech community once the first wave of companies is announced. Don’t wait to introduce your innovation to the people who can help you scale it. Apply now and take your place on Europe’s most trusted fintech stage. Photo by Fox The post Showcase Your Tech on Fintech’s Most Influential Stage: Apply to Demo at FinovateEurope 2026 appeared first on Finovate.       

Social trading and investment network eToro unveiled that it will begin rolling out its stock lending program in the UK. The capability, which is available in Europe and the UK, enables eligible users to lend out their stocks. Stock lending isn’t new. In fact, it has long been a passive revenue generator for large brokers and hedge funds. Bringing this capability to an alternative platform like eToro gives the fintech a competitive edge as it brings more transparent, value-added services to the retail trading market. As investor expectations increase, platforms that provide passive-income engines, improved liquidity, and greater control over their portfolios may gain more interest in an ever-crowded market. Facilitating the launch are global financial services company BNY and stock lending program EquiLend. Under these partnerships, BNY is acting as custodian and clearing provider, while EquiLend identifies borrowers and facilitates the lending process. eToro anticipates that the new program will allow its investors to put their portfolios to work while retaining their investments. As with most stock lending programs, borrowers post collateral, and investors can still sell their positions at any time. By partnering with institutions such as BNY and EquiLend, eToro aims to ensure operational safeguards that offer retail users institutional-grade risk management. “Launching stock lending in the UK is a key step in our mission to make passive income opportunities available to every investor,” said eToro VP of Execution Services Yossi Brandes. “With the ability to lend not just US but also global stocks, we are maximizing the potential for our clients to generate additional revenues, and this rollout sets the stage for further expansion into new markets.”  Launching in the UK expands eToro’s partnership with BNY, which it leverages for clearing and custody services for its stock and ETF offering across 19 global exchanges. “We are delighted to extend our relationship with eToro, delivering an integrated solution encompassing clearing, settlement, custody, foreign exchange and cash management to UK investors,” said BNY Executive Platform Owner of Global Clearing Victor O’Laughlen. “By combining the capabilities of eToro and EquiLend with the scale and deep expertise of BNY’s leading Global Clearing platform, this initiative aims to equip retail investors with an institutional-grade solution to support their investing journey.” Israel-based eToro said that the move marks the next step in the company’s plan to expand stock lending access to retail investors worldwide. For eToro, today’s launch is more than a feature. The expansion is a signal of the company’s strategic move into deeper monetization and institutional-grade services. Leveraging BNY’s clearing and custody infrastructure places eToro closer to the operational standards of traditional brokers while maintaining its core social-trading product. Adding features like these in partnerships with traditional financial institutions could help eToro attract more sophisticated retail investors looking for passive-income tools and greater flexibility. Founded in 2007, eToro has since raised $693 million in funding. With more than 35 million registered users and investors on its trading and investing platform, the company offers trading and investing tools that are more accessible and collaborative. eToro launched in the US market in 2019, entering a space where Robinhood had already established a six-year presence. eToro began 2025 with its public debut in May. The company is now listed on Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker ETOR. eToro has a current market capitalization of $3.5 billion. Photo by John Angel on Unsplash The post eToro Brings Stock Lending to the UK appeared first on Finovate.       

Airwallex has raised $330 million at an $8 billion valuation, boosting its total funding to $1.5 billion and setting up a major US expansion with a new San Francisco headquarters. The company’s business performance is rising, with annualized revenue surpassing $1 billion, transaction volume doubling to $235 billion, and half of its customers using multiple Airwallex products. The company is positioning itself as the backbone of global, AI-powered finance, expanding regulatory coverage to 80 licenses worldwide. Global commercial payments and financial platform Airwallex has captured fintech’s attention with its new funding round today. The Singapore-based company closed a $330 million Series G round at an $8 billion valuation, which is 30% higher than its valuation six months ago at its Series F round. Led by Addition with participation from T. Rowe Price, Activant, Lingotto, Robinhood Ventures, and TIAA Ventures, the round boosts Airwallex’s total funding to $1.5 billion and will allow the company to create AI agents and fuel product development. The company will also use the investment to fuel its global growth, including in the US. As part of this, Airwallex has established a second headquarters location in San Francisco and will invest $1 billion from 2026 to 2029 to scale its US operations, attract new employees, and expand its physical footprint and brand awareness. “We believe the future of global banking will be borderless, real-time, and intelligent,” said Airwallex CEO and co-founder Jack Zhang. “Legacy providers are fundamentally incompatible with how modern businesses operate, and our investors understand that we’re pulling ahead in the race to define this category. We’re building a modern alternative, a single platform that powers global banking, payments, billing, treasury, and spend on top of proprietary financial infrastructure. This capital will accelerate our growth, extend our technical leadership, and strengthen our position in the U S and across key markets worldwide.” Airwallex’s new round comes during a time of not only geographical expansion, but also significant growth in business performance and platform adoption. The company’s annualized revenue surpassed $1 billion in October, marking 90% year-over-year growth, while its annualized transaction volume doubled to more than $235 billion. Product depth is also increasing, with approximately half of all customers now using multiple Airwallex products, a sign of expanding product-market fit and stickiness. Airwallex has also strengthened its global regulatory footprint, holding 80 licenses and permits that enable customers to operate in 200+ countries and regions and support multi-currency checkout at scale. In 2025 alone, the company extended its regulated and local capabilities across 12 new markets, securing licenses and launching products in France, the Netherlands, Israel, Canada, Korea, Japan, New Zealand, Malaysia, Vietnam, Brazil, Mexico, the UAE, and more. As Airwallex scales its infrastructure, footprint, and product suite, investors see the company as a foundational layer for the next era of global business banking. Addition’s Lee Fixel captured this shift, noting that “Airwallex is reshaping the global business banking landscape. The traditional financial system wasn’t built for borderless businesses, and Airwallex is uniquely equipped to solve this challenge. With its global financial infrastructure, software and AI capabilities, the company is exceptionally well positioned to lead the future of global business banking.” As mentioned earlier, part of today’s investment will help Airwallex build a team of AI agents for financial workflows to eventually create a fully autonomous finance department. The agents will leverage behavioral and transactional data to automate multi-step operations such as expense approvals, policy checks, and end-to-end task orchestration. The company estimates that it will employ hundreds of agents across its platform. “As AI lowers software costs, infrastructure and data become the ultimate differentiator,” Zhang added. “Airwallex connects the full spectrum of a customer’s financial operations – money in, money out, and everything in between, giving our agents the contextual data to execute with precision. This proprietary visibility, built on our scalable financial infrastructure, is what powers agentic finance.” Photo by Mikhail Nilov The post Business Financial Management Heats Up as Airwallex Brings in $330 Million appeared first on Finovate.       

The year may be winding down, but fintech is still winding up. This morning brings news of Airwallex’s $333 million round, valuing the company at $8 billion. Grab yourself a warm cup of cheer and settle in for this week’s top fintech news. We’ll continue to add more announcements as the week progresses. Business financial management Airwallex raises $330M Series G at $8B valuation. Digits launches Ask Digits, a 24/7 AI assistant for real-time financial answers and actions. Agentic AI BNY collaborates with Google Cloud to advance its Eliza AI platform with Gemini Enterprise. Mortgages Cross River achieves milestone with $288 million commercial mortgage-backed securities transaction. Fraud, compliance, and identity Socure acquires BNPL consumer credit database Qlarifi. Credit Unions Nuuvia’s CUSO secures $4 million investment from VyStar and Desert Financial Credit Unions. Payments TenPay Global broadens integration of international wallets to Weixin Pay. Photo by Connor McManus The post Fintech Rundown: A Rapid Review of Weekly News appeared first on Finovate.       

Trulioo has joined Google’s Agent Payments Protocol (AP2) to provide its Digital Agent Passport and Know Your Agent (KYA) framework, creating a trusted identity layer for AI-driven, agent-led payments. AP2 establishes a common standard for how AI agents transact, and Trulioo ensures every agent interacting in the ecosystem is authenticated, authorized, and accountable before executing a payment. Agentic payments remain early but are poised to scale quickly as identity layers like KYA mature and combine with programmable settlement rails such as stablecoins and tokenized deposits, enabling safe, real-time autonomous transactions. Agentic payments are on the rise this season, and digital identity platform Trulioo is stepping up to help protect agent-led transactions. The Canada-based company has joined Google’s Agent Payments Protocol (AP2) initiative. With the launch, Trulioo is deepening its long-standing ties with Google, which leverages Trulioo’s Global Identity Platform for Know Your Customer (KYC) verification. Google launched AP2 in September 2025 to provide an open, standardized framework for digital payments. AP2 connects banks, fintechs, and merchants with its protocol that creates a common language for how AI agents can transact on behalf of users. Trulioo will bring its Digital Agent Passport and KYA framework to AP2. Together with Trulioo’s KYA framework, the Digital Agent Passport creates a verifiable trust layer within AP2, ensuring every digital agent is authenticated, authorized, and accountable before transacting. “The future of commerce belongs to agents that can think, act, and transact independently, but only if they can be trusted,” said Trulioo CEO Vicky Bindra. “By joining AP2, we’re helping define the identity backbone for autonomous payments, where verified agents transact transparently, responsibly, and at machine speed. This is the architecture, and the future, of trusted agentic commerce. We’re proud to be working with Google to bring verified identity to agentic payments.” Headquartered in Canada and founded in 2011, Trulioo has raised $475 million. The company offers global verification for both businesses and customers in 195 countries and with the ability to verify more than 14,000 ID documents and 700 million business entities while checking against more than 6,000 watchlists. Trulioo has demoed at 10 Finovate events, most recently showcasing its identity platform at FinovateEurope 2023. Trulioo launched its Know Your Agent (KYA) solution in August 2025. “KYA is a new identity layer designed for agent-led digital interactions, bringing trust and compliance to agentic commerce without compromising speed or user experience,” the company said. “This isn’t just technical infrastructure—it’s a real-time trust layer that quietly safeguards the ecosystem while letting everything move at machine speed.” Agentic payments are still in their early stages, largely because true autonomy requires more than intelligent agents. For the ecosystem to work, agentic payments require a secure, verifiable system for authorizing transactions without human intervention. As identity layers like KYA mature, consumers and businesses will become more comfortable allowing AI agents to initiate payments, execute purchases, manage subscriptions, or even negotiate transactions on their behalf. The shift becomes even more notable as agentic payments intersect with programmable settlement rails such as stablecoins and tokenized deposits. These payment methods enable real-time, programmable, and low-cost transactions that will help autonomous agents operate safely at scale. When combined, trusted agent identity plus programmable money could bring agent-led commerce into mainstream markets rapidly, especially if security layers like Trulioo’s are already in place. Photo by Czapp Árpád The post Trulioo Joins Google’s Agent Payments Protocol (AP2) to Secure Agent-Led Payments appeared first on Finovate.       

This week’s edition of Finovate Global features news from fintechs headquartered in Sweden. Klarna Brings Tap to Pay to 14 Markets in Europe Swedish digital bank and payment provider Klarna has introduced Tap to Pay across 14 markets in Europe. The new features bring flexible payments to the brick-and-mortar retail world at scale, and help to transform Klarna’s app into a contactless wallet ready for everyday use. “Tap to Pay brings us closer to our vision of Klarna being everywhere for everything,” Klarna Chief Product & Design Officer David Fock said. “Now you can set up a flexible payment plan and tap to pay in seconds, all inside the Klarna app. It makes everyday shopping moments significantly smoother for our Klarna customers across Europe, giving them even more flexibility and choice at checkout.” At a time when 80% of shopping in Europe is still conducted in physical stores, Klarna’s Tap to Pay solution offers consumers the seamless experience of online commerce when shopping at brick and mortar retailers. Tap to Pay is currently live for Klarna customers in Germany, Italy, Spain, France, the Netherlands, Finland, Belgium, Austria, Ireland, Portugal, Norway, Poland, Denmark, and Sweden. Klarna’s Tap to Pay announcement follows the introduction of the company’s stablecoin, KlarnaUSD, in late November. Klarna is the first bank to launch a stablecoin on Tempo, the new independent blockchain purpose-built for payments, that was started by Stripe and Paradigm. Currently live on Tempo’s testnet, KlarnaUSD is scheduled to launch on Tempo’s mainnet in 2026. “With 114 million customers and $118 billion in annual GMV, Klarna has the scale to change payments globally: with Klarna’s scale and Tempo’s infrastructure, we can challenge old networks and make payments faster and cheaper for everyone,” Klarna Co-Founder and CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski said. “Crypto is finally at a stage where it is fast, low-cost, secure, and built for scale. This is the beginning of Klarna in crypto, and I’m excited to work with Stripe and Tempo to continue to shape the future of payments.” A Finovate alum since 2012, Klarna is headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden. Tink Brings Pay by Bank Top-Ups to Fidelity International Investors As Senior Analyst Julie Muhn reported earlier this week, Fidelity International has partnered with Sweden-based open banking platform Tink. The partnership will enable Fidelity to offer account top-ups via Pay by Bank, making it easier for investors to fund their ISAs, SIPPs, cash management, and general investment accounts. A two-time Finovate Best of Show winner that was acquired by Visa in 2021, Tink enables financial institutions, fintechs, and merchants to leverage financial data to design and create personalized financial management tools, products, and services. With a single API, Tink empowers its customers to access aggregated financial data, use smart financial services, including risk insights and account verification, and build personal financial management tools. Pay by Bank is one of the fastest-growing use cases for open banking. With analysts anticipating that total open banking users will top 645 million worldwide in 2029—a 3.5x increase from 2025’s 183 million users—options such as Pay by Bank are likely to become increasingly widespread as a modern, secure payment alternative with reduced friction. “Pay by Bank represents the next evolution of open banking payments, delivering a fast, secure way to pay directly from your bank account,” Tink Head of Payments Ian Morrin said. “As adoption accelerates, we’re thrilled to see leading institutions like Fidelity put open banking at the heart of their payment experiences to make topping up investment accounts more seamless.” Founded in 2012, Tink is headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden. The fintech offers 3,000+ connections to the major banks across Europe, processes more than 10 billion transactions a year, and boasts 10,000 developers using its platform. Co-Founder Daniel Kjellén is CEO. Swedish VC Incore Invest Secures €15 Million Second Closing Incore Invest, an investment firm based in Stockholm, has raised €15 million in a second closing of its Incore Invest II fund. The fundraising brings the fund’s total capital to €40 million to help SaaS and fintech companies throughout Europe grow. “Incore Invest’s strategy has always been to back proven tech companies with strong growth potential,” Incore Invest Founder and CEO Nicolai Chamizo said in a statement. “Investors’ continued confidence in Incore Invest is very encouraging and with this second close, the round is fully equipped with capital to back the most promising European technology companies. It allows us to continue identifying and supporting the next generation of category-defining technology companies shaping the future of the industry.” Incore Invest’s successful fundraising comes at a time when a number of European venture capital firms, especially those that have targeted growth-stage or early-stage technology companies, are raising or closing new funds. For example, four funds alone—Backed VC, Notion Capital, Armilar Venture Partners, and henQ—have raised more than €300 million in capital combined this year. Among the companies in Incore Invest’s portfolio are several of innovative fintechs including Brite, a Swedish payments platform that leverages open banking to process instant payments; Mynt, a Swedish fintech that simplifies expense management via smart company cards; and Froda, a Swedish fintech and embedded finance company. Here is our look at fintech innovation around the world. Sub-Saharan Africa Kenyan fintech Jahazii raised $400,000 to provide earned wage access and payroll infrastructure technology for Africa’s informal economy. Wise secured conditional regulatory approval to go live in South Africa. Business AM looked at how Nigeria’s FairMoney Microfinance Bank expanded beyond digital lending into a full-service bank. Central and Eastern Europe Embedded finance infrastructure company YouLend announced a strategic partnership with digital financial management solution Qonto to help the firm enter the German market. Salt Edge teamed up with Romanian financial management platform, Finlayer, to bring open banking to small businesses in the country. Former Polish President Andrzej Duda joined the board of fintech firm ZEN.COM. Middle East and Northern Africa Developed in partnership with Mawarid Finance, UAE-based fintech platform Huru launched its microfinance solution, Quick Cash. Egypt’s Money Fellows topped $1.5 billion in transactions. Israel’s Haaretz profiled Matan Bar, CEO of Israel-based fintech Melio. Central and Southern Asia Financial Times interviewed Amrish Rau, CEO of Pine Labs, on the rise of Indian fintech. The Express Tribune looked at the current state of fintech innovation in Pakistan. India’s Paytm launched a new AI-powered travel app, Paytm Checkin. Latin America and the Caribbean Episode Six forged a strategic partnership with Mexico’s Xepelin to launch digital financial products in the country. São Paulo, Brazil-based fintech Cumbuca launched this week to help international companies participate in the Brazilian payments market. Colombian fintech Movii entered the Peruvian market this week. Asia-Pacific Vietnamese neobank Circle Asia Technologies launched its AI-powered PayLater card, in partnership with Pismo and Visa. South Korea’s NH NongHyup Bank conducted a blockchain-based cross-border payments pilot project. Thunes secured In-Principle Approval (IPA) for a variation on its Major Payment Institution license (MPI) from the Monetary Authority of Singapore. Photo by CARTIST on Unsplash The post Finovate Global Sweden: Tap to Pay, Pay by Bank, and Investments in Nordic Fintech appeared first on Finovate.       

MoneyGram is partnering with Fireblocks to introduce stablecoin-based settlement across its global payments network, enabling faster, lower-cost transactions and real-time liquidity management. Fireblocks’ blockchain infrastructure will power a programmable settlement layer that streamlines reconciliation, reduces pre-funding needs, enhances treasury operations, and supports large-scale stablecoin flows. As a legacy payments giant adopts digital-asset rails, fiat-backed stablecoins are becoming core infrastructure for cross-border payments and corporate treasury. Cross-border payments network MoneyGram is taking a step toward modernizing its global settlement infrastructure by partnering with Fireblocks to bring stablecoin-based settlement into its core treasury processes. The collaboration aims to enable faster payments, lower costs, and real-time liquidity across MoneyGram’s worldwide network. Fireblocks is a blockchain infrastructure and security platform designed for storing, transferring, and issuing digital assets. Founded in 2018 and headquartered in New York, the company’s suite of digital asset tools includes treasury management, wallets-as-a-service, payments, and tokenization. Fireblocks also offers stablecoin infrastructure that enables institutions to seamlessly move, hold, manage, and issue stablecoins with enterprise-grade security. Founded in 1940, MoneyGram serves 50 million clients annually with its payment network that connects over 200 countries and territories, 20,000 corridors, and close to 500,000 retail locations. “We are leading the next era of money movement by enabling money to move instantly across any channel—fiat or stablecoin,” said MoneyGram Chairman and CEO Anthony Soohoo. “Fireblocks accelerates this vision by giving us the secure, programmable infrastructure to transform global payments at scale.” The company will use Fireblocks’ stablecoin infrastructure to create a programmable settlement layer to help reduce capital requirements with pre-funding partners through continuous funding, receive stablecoin payments at scale from its partners, improve access to liquidity pools across global entities, streamline reconciliation and financial reporting for stablecoin operations, and improve treasury operations. MoneyGram will also use Fireblocks to help introduce programmable money and more resilient liquidity pathways. “MoneyGram is rebuilding the rails of cross-border settlement in real time,” said Fireblocks Co-Founder and CEO Michael Shaulov. “By moving to a multi-chain, programmable infrastructure, it’s upgrading the speed and reliability of global payments at the foundation layer—where it matters most for the people who rely on these payments every day.” For a long-standing, traditional player like MoneyGram, teaming up with Fireblocks pivots the company from traditional correspondent-bank rails toward a modern, agile payments infrastructure. Today’s partnership is an example of how fiat-backed stablecoins are becoming core plumbing for global payments and corporate treasury operations. It shows that stablecoins could provide instant, reliable, low-cost cross-border value movement at scale, while bypassing legacy banking delays and costs. Photo by David Dibert The post MoneyGram Teams with Fireblocks to Upgrade its Rails with Stablecoins appeared first on Finovate.