Rapyd acquires a piece of PayU from Prosus for $610M to scale its fintech-as-a-service platform

Rapyd, the fintech-as-a-service startup that provides APIs to enable payments, card issuing, digital wallet and other financial services to companies like Uber and Ikea, is taking a significant step forward in its growth with a big acquisition: It is paying $610 million to acquire a giant piece of

When you’ve got two exits under your belt by the age of 26

In this week's edition of The Interchange, we touch on M&As in the fintech space as AngelList nabbed a startup and Uplift got bought for less than it raised in venture funding. We get into those deals, and much more. Want to receive this in your inbox every Sunday? Sign up here. ShopifyR

Former Hulu exec is building a go-to remittance app for Indian expats

Foreign inward remittances to India have surged significantly in recent years as Indian diaspora expands globally. The past five years have seen a 30% increase, with remittances rising to $89.13 billion in 2021-22 from $69.13 billion in 2017-18, according to official government data. Naturally, a g

Upgrade acquires travel-focused BNPL startup Uplift for a song

Upgrade, a provider of personal credit lines and other consumer financial products, today announced that it’s agreed to acquire Uplift, the buy now, pay later (BNPL) vendor, for $100 million in cash and stock. It’s likely not the exit Uplift was hoping for — and a sign of serious

BlackRock and Reliance’s finance unit to form asset management venture

The world’s largest asset manager is re-entering India — and it’s doing so in a partnership with Asia’s richest man. Jio Financial Services and BlackRock have struck a deal to form a joint venture, called Jio BlackRock, aimed at serving India’s growing investor base. B

Shopify expands into credit cards as it pushes further into the fintech space

Shopify has entered the credit card game. The commerce giant announced today that it is offering Shopify Credit, a business credit card designed exclusively for its merchants. The new product marks Shopify's first pay-in-full business credit card, said Shopify President Harley F

India’s food delivery giant Swiggy launches credit card

Swiggy has become the latest Indian startup to offer its customers a credit card as the food delivery giant broadens its efforts to drive engagement and retention. The Bengaluru-headquartered startup is co-launching the credit card with HDFC Bank, India’s largest private bank. The credit card

Bolt, ex-CEO Ryan Breslow subject of SEC probe

Ryan Breslow, co-founder of the e-commerce software outfit Bolt, was subpoenaed along with the company last year by the U.S Securities and Exchange Commission. The Information reported the news first on Friday. A letter authored in April by a lawyer representing Bolt investors said the SEC was inve

Foreign visitors to China can finally go cashless like locals

Great news for those traveling to China! You can finally enjoy the seamless, cashless payment experience that you may have heard about for years and avoid the awkward interaction of asking your local friends to pay and giving them paper money that they can’t spend anywhere. This week, China&#

FedNow is finally live in the US

The U.S. government's instant payment system, FedNow Service, went live this week.  Here's a quick refresher on what that is: FedNow is an instant payment infrastructure for transferring money that promises to be a faster payment rail for financial institutions, offering immediate access t

Karat, a startup building financial tools for content creators, raises $70M

Despite earning six-to-seven-figure-a-year incomes, many content creators are denied the capital they need to expand their businesses. The reasons vary, but most are relatively young and have limited business and credit histories, and deal with inconsistent income across platforms. It’s a luc

Thunes pockets $72M at a $900M+ valuation to expand its cross-border, B2B payment platform

Thunes, a Singapore and London-based fintech that has built a payments platform for businesses to send money to each other internationally by tapping into the growing network of mobile wallets and other alternatives to bank accounts, has closed its Series C round of funding to expand its business.

Addition leads $6M seed round in Egyptian fintech Flash 

Driving financial inclusion through digital payment methods is among the top priorities for the governments of Africa's biggest tech ecosystems where cash is still king. Several initiatives launched by these governments have increased the number of banked citizens in their respective countries.

Defacto gets new credit facility to provide instant financing to small companies

French startup Defacto has closed a new securitization fund that will be used to provide short-term loans to small and medium enterprises via an embedded, API-first approach. This is a new fund of up to €167 million ($183 million) with Citi and Viola Credit acting as the lenders. This is signific