Welcome back to The exchange, where we take a look at the hottest fintech news from the previous week. If you’d like to receive The Interchange straight to your inbox every Sunday, head over here register! Due to the holiday in the United States, this is an abbreviated edition.
Buy now, pay later and come back
Both Klarna and Affirm, known primarily for their buy now, pay later businesses, revealed their quarterly results this week. And they did not disappoint.
Affirm reported that its fiscal first-quarter revenue grew 37% year over year to $497 million, while gross merchandise volume increased 28% to $5.6 billion during the same period. And their actions got a big boost As a result, it rose to $27.16 on November 9. However, she lost some of those gains on November 10 and was trading at just over $22 that afternoon.
Meanwhile, Klarna reported revenue of 6 billion crowns ($549.9 million), up about 30% from 4.6 billion crowns ($421.6 million) in the third quarter of 2022. The company also reported an operating result of 130 million crowns ($11.9 million), a massive improvement from 2.12 billion crowns ($192.6 million). loss A year ago. (All currency conversions use current SEK-USD values.)
Both companies reported fewer delinquencies, meaning they lost less money to people who didn’t make payments. It’s good news for both companies and for the space itself.
Speaking of Klarna, Alex and I joined together to report on Klarna’s confirmation that it was moving towards an IPO. We look at what happens next and what could happen if IPOs once again become successful methods of raising capital. Read more.
Weekly news
Reporter Annie Njanja has been keeping tabs on Flutterwave for more than a year since the Kenyan government accused the African fintech company of allegedly engaging in money laundering and fraud. This week, we received an update that the company is now off the hook after a court ruled that the country’s Asset Recovery Agency could drop its case against Flutterwave. Annie explains everything to you.
Mary Ann and Alex Wilhelm dedicated some Equity time discussing the encouraging signs they were seeing within the fintech industry. They talked about some mega-rounds, which we haven’t seen in a long time. The pair also discussed Klarna’s strong third-quarter results, of which we saw Simon Taylor’s opinion in X.
And speaking of results, Klarna and Affirm were not the only ones with good news in the third quarter:
- Dave’s third-quarter net loss improved 47% quarter-over-quarter, while monthly trading members rose 6% to 1.9 million.
- Flywire’s third-quarter revenue increased 29.5% year over year, and CEO Mike Massaro said in a statement that the company “delivered our highest quarter of revenue and adjusted EBITDA in its history.”
- Payoneer reported record revenue of $208 million for the quarter and saw 5% growth in active ideal customer profiles year over year.
- At Robinhood, the investment company reported that total net revenue increased 29% year over year to $467 million as customer subscriptions grew to more than 1.3 million, with 100,000 added in the third quarter alone.
Meanwhile, getting good credit isn’t easy, which is why some fintech companies have focused on preparing children and teens to be successful in this area. For example, in August, Greenlight launched its Greenlight Family Cash Mastercard. Now Step has one. CEO CJ MacDonald tweeted Late last week, the company launched Step Black, a rewards card for Generation Z aimed at building debt-free credit. Via email, MacDonald touted the card as the “world’s first secure Visa Signature rewards card” and amassed a waitlist of more than 100,000 in the past two months. It’s a 17-gram metal card with features like no minimum credit limit, $500 in annual benefits, and up to 8x cash back. You may remember that Step announced a 5% interest rate on its savings account in May, and Step Black holders will also get that rate up to $1 million FDIC-insured. — Cristina
Other articles we are reading:
tech-digital-wallets” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener”>CFPB proposes supervising Big tech digital wallets
tech” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener”>Banks turn to fintech to avoid the threat of Big tech
Arc launches international treasury product
ai-advisory-practice-focused-artificial-intelligence-generative-systems” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener”>Visa launches global ai advisory practice focused on generative systems
Belvo introduces bank debit service for Mexican companies
Bluevine launches high-yield interest rate for SMEs
PayByPhone has been acquired by Fleetcorand was acquired by Volkswagen in 2016.
Financing and mergers and acquisitions
As seen on TechCrunch
Enable, a platform for managing B2B refunds, is now worth $1 billion
Volante raises $66 million for payments technology for banks and other legacy financial companies
Mogul Club raises $3.6 million for its effort to make real estate investing more accessible
Seen elsewhere
Holdings denies report on agreement to acquire Melio
ai-fintech-black-ore-raises-60-million-in-deal-led-by-andreessen-horowitz#xj4y7vzkg” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener”>Andreessen Horowitz Co-Leads $60M Fintech Investment in ai
Valor Capital foresees 500 million dollars for two new funds
Singapore-based fintech LXA raises $10 million in latest funding round
Image credits: Bryce Durbin
