LATAM's Fintech Explosion: Nubank's Big Move and NovoPayment's Mastercard Breakthrough!
Future of Fintech - Edition #105 (5th-12th Feb)
Welcome to your weekly dive into the pulsating heart of fintech innovation! 🫖
Get ready to sip on the freshest brew of fintech trends and breakthroughs, served piping hot, just the way you like it. Our weekly digest, packed with trends and innovations shaping the future of finance, is here to energise your Tuesday with all the fintech must-knows! Last week’s moves highlighted a continued interest in expanding market reach and improving access to financial products and services through strategic partnerships and regulatory compliance. So, grab yourself a seat at our table, where we’ll keep you at the forefront of fintech evolution, one headline at a time!
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What’s on the fintech menu today?
📖 Today’s Must Read: SMB Financing Gets a Makeover with Embedded Finance
🌟 Fintech Fiesta: The Week's Hot 10!
🌐 ‘Byte’ Buzz: Fintech highlights, sorted by segment!
🔗 Link Up: Your gateway to resourceful links!
Fin-teresting Stories in Fintech 📰
Embedded Lending: A Lifeline for SMBs in the Financial Quagmire
Are you tired of jumping through hoops just to secure a loan for your small or midsize business? You're not alone.
SMBs worldwide have been wrestling with the complexities of traditional lending processes, facing paperwork mountains and collateral hurdles that seem insurmountable. With 48% of SMBs craving quick credit access, financial institutions and innovative Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platforms have taken a partnership-driven approach to address the gap by leveraging a new era of financing - Embedded Lending. By integrating diverse data sources, these vertical SaaS platforms help paint a complete picture of the business for smarter credit decisions.
🔍 Dive into our blog to uncover:
✅ The hidden challenges SMBs face in securing loans from traditional financial institutions.
✅ How embedded lending is transforming the lending landscape for SMBs.
✅ The power of partnership between vertical SaaS platforms and financial institutions to unlock financing opportunities.
Ready to break free from the loan quagmire? Click below to read the full blog and unlock the secrets to seamless financing with embedded lending 👇
Now serving the 105th Edition of our weekly fintech brew – your cosy cuppa filled with the latest opportunities brewing in the financial technology realm!
The Week's Hot 10! ♨️🔟
Embedding financing in the e-commerce space was the highlight of the past week, with Citi Retail Services picking technology from ChargeAfter to power its Citi Pay products that let merchants offer credit and instalment loans at the point of sale. Fiserv also signed 17 large e-commerce merchants, including eBay and Uber, to its debit networks Star and Accel following the Federal Reserve’s clarification of the debit routing rule.
Players were seen leveraging integrations to power more efficient solutions, as Trustly integrated MX Data Enhancement as part of its Pay with Bank solution to enable consumer-allowed transaction data to be cleansed and categorised to provide comprehensive information for merchants to better understand their users’ requirements. Meanwhile, Consensys and Robinhood Markets launched the integration of Robinhood Connect with MetaMask to augment crypto purchases, providing more users with frictionless, secure, and self-custodial onboarding to web3.
Latin America was a hotbed of approvals the past week – Nubank obtained regulatory approval from Garrigues to launch its savings platform in Colombia, and payments infrastructure provider NovoPayment received Mastercard certification, as part of the Mastercard Network Enablement Partner program, to switch and process Mastercard transactions in Mexico.
New and innovative platforms across sectors made their debut – FIS introduced its interoperable FIS Open Access platform that lets its clients’ customers share banking data by signing agreements with multiple data networks. At the same time, KakaoBank opened an artificial intelligence (AI) lab at Digital Realty's ICN10 data centre in Seoul, aimed at improving its AI services, creating customised content, and carrying out research and development for innovative financial offerings.
Leveraging groundbreaking technologies to launch diverse offerings, Mitsubishi Motors North America introduced ClickShop 2.0 in collaboration with AutoFi and Santander Consumer USA to provide a seamless and hassle-free experience from browsing online to purchasing in the showroom. Concurrently, UBS launched an investment-grade tokenised warrant on the Ethereum public blockchain network in Hong Kong, aimed at enhancing transparency, reducing transaction fees, and allowing for more flexible trading hours.
Now, for the ‘byte’-sized fintech buzz –
The Embedded Finance realm was brimming with strategic collaborations and innovative moves, revolutionising the way financial services are accessed and integrated into various aspects of daily life.
UK-based embedded finance partner for brands Aro partnered with Equifax to deliver a new data-driven marketplace, providing a new credit card and loan service for the Equifax Marketplace. The solution is set to enable clients and customers to compare credit cards, as well as secured loans and personal loan tools in a simple and efficient manner.
Affirm and Afterpay are rethinking their loyalty strategies as buy now, pay later (BNPL) companies are turning to paid subscription models to drive ongoing engagement. Affirm shut down its rewards program, instead exploring the introduction of a subscription service called Affirm Plus in September. Afterpay, for its part, has its invite-only Afterpay Plus Card, which charges users $5.99 a month and expands the range of merchants at which consumers can use BNPL.
Developments in Open Finance indicated a broader trend towards embracing open banking principles, fostering innovation and enhancing customer-centric financial services across various regions and sectors.
NatWest has been confirmed as a supplier on the Crown Commercial Service’s (CCS) new Dynamic Purchasing System (DPS) for open banking. Users of the DPS will be able to access NatWest’s open banking solutions, Payit by NatWest, which also includes Confirmation of Payee (CoP) API services to prevent fraud.
Ant International expanded its partnership with Yapily to introduce European commercial variable recurring payments (VRPs) for e-commerce via open banking on mobile payment platforms, in partnership with HungryPanda. HungryPanda has launched both commercial VRP ‘One Click Payment’ and standard open banking payment ‘Pay by Bank’, powered by Ant International's payment processing solution Antom.
Step into the Digital Finance realm, characterised by a heightened focus on addressing the diverse needs of users while prioritising security and consumer protection.
Branch and Solv by Standard Chartered joined forces to extend loans, provide business development support, and establish market linkages for Kenyan MSMEs. By bridging the critical credit gap and offering financial guidance, the partnership is poised to accelerate business connections throughout the country.
US-based travel tech company Sabre partnered with Revolut to help travel agencies manage convenient international B2B payments, increase operational efficiency and security, and automate reconciliation and data tracking.
Players in the Fintech Infrastructure space were seen leveraging innovative tech for the pursuit of enhanced efficiency and accessibility in financial services globally.
Puerto Rico’s Segura Bank International (SBI) tapped Temenos’ cloud-based core banking platform to power its new digital bank seeking to serve mid-to-high earners in Latin America.
Mastercard teamed up with Beep to focus on enabling contactless acceptance of Mastercard cards in the Metro Rail Transit Line 3 (MRT-3 Line) and buses in the region of the Philippines. The partnership aligns with the government’s aim to accelerate the overall digitalisation of payments and support digital inclusion, as well as with the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’ Digital Payments Transformation Roadmap.
Take a look at the ongoing expansion of the DeFi landscape, driven by increasing institutional interest, regulatory compliance efforts, and diversification of offerings across different blockchain networks.
Kraken successfully secured a VASP registration from the Dutch Central Bank, where the registration will allow the company to expand into an important European market, as well as to provide customers and clients in the area with its suite of solutions and expertise.
The Commercial Bank International (CBI) and Fuze signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to jointly explore digital asset innovation, under the comprehensive regulatory frameworks of the UAE. The agreement provides foundations for new use cases that could explore the potential of blockchain and other digital assets, including payments and investments.
Dive into the green lawns of Green Finance, marked by the increasing integration of sustainability considerations into financial decision-making.
HSBC partnered with Google to provide financing to companies cherry-picked by Google to join its Google Cloud Ready-Sustainability programme. Members of the programme undergo a validation process, with Google assessing the quality and efficacy of the technology in development as well as its traction among customers.
Investment data and research provider MSCI launched MSCI Private Company Data Connect, a new platform aimed at collecting and communicating sustainability and climate data from private companies to general partner investors and lenders.
And that's a wrap 👋
We hope you enjoyed this edition of the Weekly Fintech Brew!
As a reward for making it all the way here, enjoy a curated list of awesome fintech resources to keep your curiosity cup full to the brim. Cheers to continuous learning!
🔗 Link Up! –
The Real-Time Payments World Map Report - PYMNTS Intelligence, The Clearing House
Country Risk Atlas 2024: Assessing non-payment risk in major economies Report - Allianz
How embedded finance boosts revenue for SaaS products Blog - Weavr
2023 Roundup: Open banking flips the traditional lending game Blog - WhiteSight
2023 Roundup: The Surge of Card Issuing Innovations by Payment Processors Blog - WhiteSight
OakNorth’s Challenger Bank Playbook Report - WhiteSight
Hungry for more fintech insights? Check out some of our other work at WhiteSight.
If you're someone who likes to read think pieces, you will likely love our monthly blog, Fintersections, where our team members analyse the convergence of fintech with the world.
Fintech research is in the WhiteSight DNA, so if you'd like to get in touch for features, sponsorships, and content marketing services, reach out to us at hello@whitesight.net.
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