While the news this week was dominate by the Robinhood saga there was plenty of important fintech news that happened including a massive new round by the world’s most valuable digital bank. Here are what I consider to be the top 10 most important fintech news stories of the past week.
GameStop Stock Game Got Stomped from Bloomberg – My favorite take on the Robinhood/GameStop drama from this past week came from Matt Levine. This is a long read but a thorough look at what actually happened this week.
Fintech darling Nubank raises blockbuster $400M Series G at $25B valuation from TechCrunch – It is difficult to overstate the importance of Nubank not just to Brazil but to all of Latin American fintech. To go from 12 million customers in 2019 to 34 million today with zero marketing spend is an incredible achievement.
Plaid launches Deposit Switch to help banks, fintechs compete for direct deposits from Banking Dive – Plaid launched a new product this week that makes it easier and faster for consumers to change their bank destination for paychecks.
Jack Ma’s Ant Plans Major Revamp in Response to Chinese Pressure from The Wall Street Journal – Chinese regulators have told Ant Group they need to become a bank holding company and the fintech behemoth is putting together a plan to do just that.
Coinbase Chooses Direct Listing Route to Public Markets from Crunchbase – Coinbase is eschewing the traditional IPO route in favor of a direct listing.
VCs flood into banking-as-a-service from The Financial Times – The banking-as-a-service/embedded finance segment is one of the hottest segments in all of fintech.
FedNow Details Pilot Program Participants from PYMNTS – Instant payments is on the horizon as the Federal Reserve announced the list of the more than 100 companies that will be participating in the pilot program.
JPMorgan Funds $686 Million in Mortgages Through London Fintech from Bloomberg – LendInvest has closed a £500 million deal with JPMorgan Chase to invest in UK buy-to-let property loans.
Digital Banking: US based Current Says it Helped Consumers Save Over $100 Million in Overdraft Fees from Crowdfund Insider – I am a big fan of companies that help reduce overdraft fees and Current is helping its two million customers do just that.
Small-Business Owners Promised More PPP Loan Application Help from The Wall Street Journal – Yes, the new round of PPP loans is ongoing and it is not surprising that there have been some new glitches.
Peter Renton is the chairman and co-founder of LendIt Fintech, the world’s first and largest digital media and events company focused on fintech. Peter has been writing about fintech since 2010 and he is the author and creator of the Fintech One-on-One Podcast, the first and longest-running fintech interview series. Peter has been interviewed by the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, The New York Times, CNBC, CNN, Fortune, NPR, Fox Business News, the Financial Times, and dozens of other publications.