THIS WEEK’S FUNDING NEWS OVERVIEW
For the past week’s funding news overview, we highly recommend reading our weekly #DoneDeal newsletter 👇
👀 Are you interested in funding news from the FinTech space?
💡 Read all about it in my weekly overview article and get the latest funding news from the global FinTech space in your inbox every week.
👀 NEWS HIGHLIGHT
Belvo’s founders, Pablo Viguera and Uri Tintoré, have been selected to join the Endeavor network. The support from Endeavor’s community of global entrepreneurs will be essential to support Belvo’s continued growth.
Endeavor is the leading global community of, by, and for High-Impact Entrepreneurs and is on a mission to build thriving entrepreneurial ecosystems in emerging and underserved markets worldwide. Endeavor Entrepreneurs have had a significant track record of impact, created more than 3.9 million jobs, and generated combined revenue of over $42B. S
👉 Read the full article here.
📰 ARTICLE
Bitso’s CEO Daniel Vogel is confident that the downward trend of cryptocurrencies is cyclical and momentary.
The Mexican entrepreneur recalls that a similar situation
occurred in 2017, but it did not prevent the growth of the crypto exchange platform, currently valued at $2.2 billion.
Despite the so-called crypto winter, Vogel assures users’ interest in the crypto world continues. Due to demand, it has decided to launch a debit card in alliance
with Mastercard.
👉 Read the full Bloomberg article here.
👨💻 BLOG
In November last year, Latinometrics reported 21 Latin American unicorns (startups worth $1B+). Today, about ten months later, there are 32. The most significant increase happened in Mexico, where unicorns doubled to eight.
💡INSIGHTS
Colombia's Daviplata and Nequi are the country’s most popular digital wallets, with 15.6 million and 13.5 million users, respectively.
👉 Read the full article here.
NOW, ON TO THE SUMMARY OF LAST WEEK'S NEWS
☕️ REGIONAL HIGHLIGHTS
⭐️ Wibond (YC W22) & Yuno, two Newtopia VC startups, join forces. Link here.
⭐️Latú Seguros, a Latin America-based InsurTech, raised $6.7m in its pre-seed funding round.
⭐️ Ebanx’s ‘Latin America Summit’ leaves Brazil and arrives in Mexico for the first time. Link here.
⭐️Rico announced plans to enter the crypto market by offering digital asset products and services starting next year. Link here.
BRAZIL
Ripio has started rolling out a prepaid debit card in Brazil that allows payments to be made in cryptocurrency and earns cashback rewards in bitcoin. Link here.
Latú Seguros, a Latin America-based InsurTech, raised $6.7m in its pre-seed funding round. The funding round was led by CRV and Monashees, with the participation of ONEVC, Latitude, and SVAngel. Link here.
In its latest funding round, Creditas proved that valuations for the stronger fintechs can buck the falling trend seen among the prominent, publicly listed startups. Link here.
Brazilian Central Bank to accelerate blockchain and digital currency projects.
Brazil´s Central Bank announced the fifth stage of its LIFT LAB innovation laboratory. Link here.
Digitra.com launches trading platform using Nasdaq's cloud-based technology. Nasdaq’s Marketplace Services Platform will support Digitra’s new "trade-to-earn" feature that awards tokens for every executed trade. Link here.
Rico announced plans to enter the crypto market by offering digital asset products and services starting next year. The company will also expand into banking with plans to launch credit cards and digital account services. Link here.
ARGENTINA
Shoppers in Argentina could soon be paying for their weekly grocery shop in crypto, thanks to a collaboration between Mastercard and Binance. Customers can spend crypto in more than 90m merchants worldwide. Link here.
COLOMBIA
Former Rappi, Paola Neira is the founder of Latú, an insurance startup for businesses that have raised one of the most significant amounts for pre-Seed investment, $6.7M. The money, also contributed by ONEVC, Latitud, and SVAngels, will help build Latú, software for business insurance. Link here.
MEXICO
Ebanx’s ‘Latin America Summit’ leaves Brazil and arrives in Mexico for the first time. This is the sixth edition of the event organized by the Brazilian fintech and will include the participation of Mastercard, Mercado Pago, Nubank, Rappi, and Ualá. Link here.
Life Clips, Inc., the parent company of Belfrics Group, launched an operation in Mexico led by Manuel Esquivel and Carlos Arce, two senior professionals with a wealth of experience in the Mexican market. Link here.
Plerk lands a $12M investment led by SoftBank Spinoff Upload Ventures. The employee-wellness startup’s founders were selected by Y Combinator but adapted the business due to the pandemic. Link here.
URUGUAY
Unicorn dLocal (DLO) saw its revenues increase to $101.2 million in the second quarter, a 72% increase from the same period of last year. Kanovich said the company enjoyed “strong growth” in payments volume and revenues “despite the high comparison base of last year.” In both cases, growth was 16% versus the previous quarter. Link here.
If you are a fintech startup and have over 100 questions, send me an email. Maybe I can answer a few.