The bright side of fintech financing results – TechCrunch

Welcome to The Interchange! If you received this in your inbox, thank you for registering and your declaration of trust. If you are reading this as a post on our site, sign up here so you can receive it directly in the future. Every week I want to take a look at the hottest fintech news from last week. This will include everything from funding rounds to trends to an analysis of a particular place to hot take on a particular company or phenomenon. There’s a lot of fintech news out there, and it’s my job to keep me on top – and understand it – so you can stay up to date. – Mary Ann

CB Insights released its global State of Venture report last week, while PitchBook released its own US-focused venture report. Of course, we could not wait to dig into the findings of both.

Alex Wilhelm and Natasha Mascarenhas – who also happen to be my partners in crime Equity Podcast – and I went through the numbers to give you all the details here.

At a high level, it is no surprise that funding flowing into fintech startups was down both globally and in the US in the second quarter of 2022. And it was not just funding. Everything was down. New unicorn births, M & As, stock exchange listings.

But the results are not as gloom and doom as they may seem at first glance.

First, fintech continues to account for a significant share of global financing. In 2021, an estimated 21% of all venture agreements were fintech. In the second quarter of 2022, according to CB Insights, investments in fintech startups were not far behind in the second quarter of 2022. It is not far off last year and signals that while, yes, fewer dollars are invested in general, fintech still attracts serious investor interest .

Another thing. While it is clear that this year will be far more subdued for fintech investments globally and in the US, it is still on track to crush 2020 results. In summary, as Alex wrote: “We see a downturn, but not a refuge in full clothing; things are still more active in terms of capital in the fintech world now than they were two years ago. “

Finally, a few weeks ago, I took some time and wrote that investors seemed to favor later deals. Based on the results from the CB Insights report, it was in fact in contrast to what took place throughout the second quarter.

I can tell you from a journalist’s perspective that we are stepping down considerably to cover one-off funding rounds and new fund closures. As always, there are just too many of them for us to cover them all and actually do a good, comprehensive job. We have also come to question how much value there is in this practice. While new fundraising and fundraising are still important news events, most of us here at TC are more selective than ever. In our view, it is more important to connect the points for our readers and generally be available to jump on important news than to accept 10 embargoes a week. So when pitching, be sure to point out what makes your business / news stand out. Why is it unique? Why should our readers care? Is it a trend? I could go on and on.

So while we still get pitching (a whole bunch), we’re considering pitching with a larger image lens more than ever and hope you’ll do the same when pitching.

Weekly news

The business expense category continues to evolve. Last week, I spoke with Airbase founder and CEO Thejo Kote about the fact that the company just secured $ 150 million in debt financing led by Goldman Sachs. Companies close credit limits all the time, however Reasons behind the features is often more interesting than the financing itself.

Through a Zoom interview, Kote reiterated that it is still a priority to generate SaaS revenue for the company. But, he said, since the company has served medium-sized and early businesses over the years, it has offered them a pre-financed card that they can use to make purchases. In recent months, however, Airbase has realized that many can take advantage of the opportunity to make purchases with “30 days of float”, the manager said.

“We started this process by offering a payment card model because as we continue to grow and scale revenue and increase our customer base more aggressively, we found that there are definitely customers out there who can not afford to give up on 30 days of flow as a cards give them either because of cash flow reasons or because of philosophical reasons, Kote said.

In particular, competitor Brex – which started offering a credit card to startups – earlier this year announced “a big push” for both software and businesses. Now it seems that Airbase is making its own big push – into the corporate card space.

“Now we offer a short line and we have the guarantee capability. Over the last six to eight months, we have done it off our own balance sheet,” Kote told TechCrunch. our to sign our customers and provide the liquid capital. “Hence its recent debt financing.

Kote emphasized that he does not believe that the move puts Airbase in the lending category.

“We are not a lender. We will never be a lender,” he said.

In valuation news, Klarna finally confirmed what we already knew – that it had raised more money at a significantly lower value. That made Alex ask if the new valuation makes Affirm “cheap”? Meanwhile, Stripe – another fintech with European roots – saw the internal value of the shares fall by 28%, sources told the Wall Street Journal and as reported by TechCrunch. Journal reported that the valuation cut comes from a price change of 409A, determined by an independent party, and that it affects the value of Stripe’s common stock. Stripe, for his part, declined to comment.

When we talk about payment giants, Mastercard announced an expansion of the partner network to include open banking, with the aim of quickly tracking open banking adoption for fintechs, merchants and lenders. The goal, a spokesman told me via email, is to “give customers easy access to qualified fintech partners who can quickly track open banking solutions for payments and lending.”

In other fintech news this week:

Watch TechCrunch

PayTalk promises to handle all kinds of payments by voice, but the app has a long way to go

Wave, a Stripe-backed African fintech valued at $ 1.7 billion, cut 15% of employees in June

Plaid adds read-only support for leading crypto exchanges

And elsewhere

Marqeta names the ex-Twilio boss as its new product manager

Goldman hires the Google chief to lead the newly created application for applied innovation

Financing and M&A

Watch TechCrunch

Child finance startup GoHenry is marching into Europe with the Pixpay acquisition

Google Gradient supports Penny to help UK workers merge and manage their retirement pots

Africa-focused Zazuu raises $ 2 million to scale its cross-border payment marketplace

Kadmos, a fintech that helps migrant workers get paid, raises $ 29.5 million

Urise banks $ 1.4 million to be a “family office” for Gen Z.

For businesses looking for low-code fintech infrastructure options, there is a Quiltt for that

Mexican fintech startup Stori reaches unicorn status with $ 50M share increase

Wefox raises $ 400 million worth $ 4.5 billion to counter insurtech downtrend

Look elsewhere

The Brazilian lender Creditas raises 200 million dollars, buys a bank

Northwestern Mutual expands business accelerator for black entrepreneurs

When fintech converges with proptech, a $ 52 million valuation bet appears at the end of a $ 12 million Series A series.

Prepaid Technologies acquires incentive provider WorkStride

Now for a non-fintech related PSA: For all you robotics lovers, TechCrunch has created a great selection of sessions for #TechCrunchRobotics! And BONUS, this is a free event. Secure your place today. Speaking of events, I’m so happy to attend TechCrunch Disrupt in October and meet not only my colleagues but also many of our loyal readers!

That was it for this Sunday. Wish you all a good week and nothing but good mood. Xoxo, Mary Ann