Author: Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz)

inbanx Taps Corserv To Launch Visa Commercial Card Offering

inbanx Taps Corserv To Launch Visa Commercial Card Offering
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news
  • Business budgets and digital payments platform inbanx has partnered with Corserv.
  • inbanx will leverage Corserv’s Payment Cards as a Service API to offer its business customers a Visa commercial credit card.
  • According to Juniper Research, the number of payment cards issued via digital platforms will grow 170% between now and 2027.

Business budgets and digital payments platform inbanx is boosting its offerings today by partnering with card issuer Corserv. Texas-based inbanx is integrating Corserv’s Payment Cards as a Service API (PCaaSA) into its platform to offer a more holistic business payments platform.

Integrating Corserv’s PCaaSA will enable inbanx to offer a Visa commercial credit card to its business clients. The new modern payment card solution will offer real-time, configurable spend controls and cooperative authorization for businesses that rely on hierarchical approvals and spending limits.

“Our highly configurable PCaaSA platform simplifies complex processes for inbanx to launch and embed commercial cards in a secure, compliant and flexible way,” said Corserv CEO Anil Goyal. “We are thrilled to work with inbanx to integrate with their innovative budget and expense management solution.”

Founded in 2021, inbanx helps businesses budget, manage their card program, and control spending across teams. By automatically reporting the expenses, inbanx’s solution eliminates the need for employees to fill out manual expense reports.

“We serve our customers with an innovative and easy-to-use solution that adopts the next generation of payment capabilities to allow businesses and their employees to spend efficiently,” said inbanx CEO Rob Kaczmarek. “Corserv’s payment card platform was the only solution that afforded us the customizability and flexibility to build exactly what we needed for our customers.”

Corserv has been helping banks and fintechs offer issuing processing and program management services for credit, debit, and prepaid cards since it was founded in 2009. The Atlanta, Georgia-based company has raised $2.1 million in funding and recently named Anil Goyal as its new CEO.

Modern card issuing is a hot space in the fintech realm, especially as banking-as-a-service and embedded finance becomes more popular. Juniper Research expects the number of payment cards issued via digital platforms to grow 170% between now and 2027, increasing from 500 million in 2023 to 1.3 billion by 2027. Global leaders in the modern card issuing space include Thales, G+D, FIS, Fiserv, and Marqeta.

Photo by Anna Tarazevich

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Raisin U.S. Appoints New CEO

Raisin U.S. Appoints New CEO
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news
  • Raisin has appointed Cetin Duransoy as CEO of the company’s U.S. division, SaveBetter by Raisin.
  • Duransoy comes to Raisin from Fundbox, where he served as President and COO.
  • Today’s announcement follows Raisin’s $64.7 million capital raise in March of this year.

Savings and investment product marketplace Raisin has appointed a new CEO for its U.S. savings division. The Berlin-based company has selected Cetin Duransoy to head SaveBetter by Raisin, its U.S. savings platform originally launched in 2020.

Duransoy

Raisin launched SaveBetter in 2020 to serve as an online marketplace where customers can choose from a variety of savings products, including savings accounts, money market deposit accounts, and certificates of deposit. The savings tool enables users to access more favorable rates than most traditional savings accounts from a single portal.

SaveBetter has seen impressive growth recently, having added $1 billion in assets under management in the past three-to-four months. Additionally, over the same time period, the company has brought 30 financial brands onto its online marketplace. 

In the release, Duransoy said this is an “exciting time” to join Raisin as CEO. “Having already established itself in the U.S. market, demonstrating scale to banking partners and tangible benefits in increased returns for everyday Americans, Raisin is poised to lead the way in further disrupting the American cash savings market and providing a valuable tool to help millions of savers secure their financial future,” he added.

Duransoy has more than 20 years of experience in financial services. He most recently served as President and COO Fundbox, and has also held senior positions at companies including Capital One and Visa.

Today’s announcement comes just over a month after Raisin raised $64.7 million (€60 million) in a Series E funding round led by M&G’s Catalyst and Goldman Sachs. The round boosted Raisin’s total funding to almost $305 million since it was founded in 2012.

Raisin counts more than one million customers and $31.7 billion (€38 billion) assets under management across the U.S., U.K., and European Union. The company taps its network of more than 400 banks and financial service providers from 30+ countries to offer its catalogue of savings, investment, and pension products. Tamas Giorgadse is Co-Founder and CEO.

Photo by ROMAN ODINTSOV

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FinovateEurope Talks: Founders’ Stories

FinovateEurope Talks: Founders’ Stories
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: FinovateEurope 2023, Marketing

We see founders from across all fintech sectors at every Finovate event, and FinovateEurope 2023 was no different. At last month’s event, we gave five fintech founders a microphone to answer five questions.

In the four-minute video below, you’ll hear from Katalin Kauzli, Co-Founder and Business Development Director of Partner Hub; Gonzalo de la Peña, Founder and Chief Business Development Officer at Openfinance; Alexander Lempka, Co-Founder and CEO at Connect Earth; Elizabeth Rossiello, CEO at AZA Finance; and Anandhi Dhukaram, CEO and Founder at Esdha.

Each of these experts talks about their struggles, advice for running a company, what they wish they knew sooner, and who they could not operate without.

Photo by Suzy Hazelwood

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Twitter Needs these 6 Things to Become an “Everything App”

Twitter Needs these 6 Things to Become an “Everything App”
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: List series, Thought Leadership

Ever since Elon Musk purchased Twitter last October for $44 million, he has been hinting of spinning the social media giant into what he is calling “X, the everything app.” In fintech, “everything apps” are known as super apps, and they exist primarily in Asia.

One of the latest developments in transitioning Twitter into a super app is Musk’s move to change Twitter’s name to X Corp. But a super app is much more than a name. Here’s a look at what the social media app currently offers, what it’s working on, and what it still needs to become a fully fledged super app.

What it has

Social
Social is most certainly Twitter’s strongest attribute. The micro-blogging platform was founded in 2006 and currently has around 450 monthly active users. While this is a considerable user base, however, it pales in comparison to well-known super app WeChat, which counts 1.3 billion monthly active users.

Investment tools
Earlier this month, Twitter partnered with eToro to not only offer real-time pricing data for stocks, but also to facilitate trades. The trades, however, do not take place within Twitter’s interface. Instead, users are routed to eToro’s website for stock details and to make trades.

What it’s (publicly) working on

Generative AI
Last week, Musk unveiled a new company called X.AI, The move confirmed rumors of his plans to launch a generative AI product after he purchased thousands of graphic processing units. X.AI is expected to compete with OpenAI, which Musk co-founded in 2015 but left in 2018 to avoid a conflict of interest.

While most super apps do not boast their own generative AI tool, adding a powerful chatbot such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT would be a major differentiating factor

Payments
Musk is publicly vociferous about his plan to add Venmo-like payments capabilities to Twitter. And it’s not just talk. Twitter filed with the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) and is also in the process of obtaining necessary state licenses, as well.

After Twitter begins facilitating peer-to-peer payments, it may begin offering more digital bank-like tools such as a high-yield savings account or even an X-branded payment card. This leads the conversation into what Twitter still needs to become a super app.

What’s missing

Personal finance
Twitter already offers stock trading (through a third party) and it is working on offering peer-to-peer payments. There is more to personal finance, however, than just investing and spending. In order to truly become an “everything app,” Twitter must offer brick-and-mortar payments, as well as an in-app dashboard that helps users track their spending, savings, and investments.

Shopping
This may end up being one of the most challenging aspects for Twitter to add in a way that would compete with the current top super app contenders in the U.S.– Walmart and PayPal. Currently, Walmart offers consumers access to goods from an Amazon-like supplier base, as well as to goods in their local Walmart store. PayPal’s shopping experience is less compelling, but offers deals from major service providers and retailers (including Walmart).

For Twitter to start a shopping experience from scratch wouldn’t be unfathomable, but it would take a long time. If it is seeking to compete with Walmart as a super app, it will likely need to find success via a partnership.

Transportation
A few of the most well-known super apps– Grab, Gojek, and Ola– began as transportation apps. Adding transportation capabilities has the potential to draw users into the app on a daily basis because they not only facilitate commutes via ride-hailing or public transportation payments, they also facilitate hyper-local delivery, grocery delivery, and restaurant delivery. These aspects play major roles in the lives of consumers.

Health services
Amazon, Walmart, and others have tackled the fragmented healthcare industry. Providing affordable health services, such as appointment booking, tele-health calls, records management, and ask-a-nurse services in a single place provides a lot of value for end users.

Health services will not be a primary driver bringing users into Twitter’s super app, but it will certainly help to keep them around and may even help target the app’s older users.

Insurance
Similar to adding health services, insurance tools will not serve as a primary draw for users. However, offering tools such as a digital lock box with insurance cards, contact information, coverage options, and payment history is a valuable add-on and can help reach older users not necessarily seeking social or payment capabilities.

Government and public services
To become a well-rounded super app, Twitter should add government and public services, such as public transportation payment and tracking, library cards, and tax preparation services. In the U.S. however, with the advent of FedNow and the potential addition of a CBDC, the government may end up beating Twitter to the punch with a super app of its own.

Photo by Possessed Photography on Unsplash

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Splitit Launches SplititExpress to Enable Checkout in Under 2-Seconds

Splitit Launches SplititExpress to Enable Checkout in Under 2-Seconds
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, SplitIt
  • Splitit is launching a new white-labeled payment offering called SplititExpress.
  • The new tool supports installment payments via GPay and ApplePay, and helps customers check out in under two seconds.
  • The merchant-branded checkout experience eliminates the typical visual clutter of online checkout interfaces by removing logos.

Buy now, pay later (BNPL) company SplitIt is launching a new white-labeled payment offering called SplititExpress. The new tool enables companies to facilitate a checkout process that takes fewer than two seconds while also supporting installment payments via GPay and ApplePay.

SplititExpress allows for a merchant-branded experience that eliminates the visual clutter by removing multiple logos and checkout options. It also empowers businesses by giving them full ownership of their customers’ journey and first-party data.

Splitit’s Installments-as-a-Service product is a BNPL tool that leverages Checkout.com’s payment-acquiring capabilities to enable consumers to pay for a good or a service in installments, interest-free. The Installments-as-a-Servce tool differentiates itself from traditional BNPL offerings, however, because it is completely white-labeled and offers customers a merchant-branded experience. Because of this, during the checkout flow, customers are not redirected to a third party. What’s more, because Splitit relies on a consumer’s existing credit card, the company does not require additional credit checks. All of this results in less friction for the customer and better control over customer relationships for the merchant.

“Reducing technical uplift for our Merchants is always top of mind at Splitit, that’s why SplititExpress can be embedded into their checkouts by simply adding a few lines of code,” said Splitit Chief Technology Officer Ran Landau. “The result is an end-to-end process that takes less than 2-seconds for a consumer to pay with installments, compared to the average 1 to 2-minutes that even the fastest legacy BNPL’s offer.”

SplititExpress also enables merchants to add their own branding and messaging, and choose the repayment option that best suits their customers. By helping merchants customize these details of the payments experience, SplitIt anticipates it will help improve the overall user experience during the checkout process.

 Founded in 2012 as PayItSimple, Splitit is based in Atlanta with offices in London and Australia, as well as an R&D center in Israel. The company is listed on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) under ticker code SPT and also trades on the US OTCQX under tickers SPTTY and STTTF. In recent years, Splitit has partnered with Stripe, Shopify, and Alipay to act as an Installments-as-a-Service option for their merchant clients.

Photo by Monstera

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The European Payments Initiative Makes Acquisitions to Fuel New European Unified Payment Solution

The European Payments Initiative Makes Acquisitions to Fuel New European Unified Payment Solution
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Mergers & Acquisitions
  • The European Payments Initiative (EPI) acquired two payments companies– Currence-owned payment solution iDEAL and payment solutions provider Payconiq.
  • EPI will leverage the new acquisitions to build a unified payment solution for Europe. 
  • The unified payment scheme will begin by offering P2P payments by the end of 2023 across France and Germany.

Payments solutions initiative European Payments Initiative (EPI) announced it has acquired two payments companies and has simultaneously unveiled plans to launch an instant payments solution for Europe.

EPI is purchasing Currence-owned payment solution iDEAL and payment solutions provider Payconiq International (PQI) for undisclosed amounts. The three companies are joining forces to organize EPI’s unified payment solution for Europe. 

“EPI will leverage the strong operational experience, know-how and local market knowledge of these companies,” said EPI CEO Martina Weimert. “We are developing a new, scalable platform to address the modern and evolving payment needs of European consumers and merchants in the best possible way, with efficient, state-of-the-art technology.”

Based in the Netherlands, iDEAL is the region’s major payment scheme. In fact, iDEAL’s payment scheme operator, Currence, counts all major Dutch banks as members. In the Netherlands, 55% of online transactions use iDEAL to facilitate payments. iDEAL was first launched in 2005 and was revamped 15 years later in 2020 to accommodate for the growth of ecommerce transactions and updated consumer expectations.

Founded in 2014, PQI offers a mobile payment platform that can be used in-store, online, and for peer-to-peer money transfers. With headquarters in Amsterdam, the company operates in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, and Luxembourg.

Both iDEAL and PQI will help build the EPI digital wallet solution that will offer instant, account-to-account payments under a single brand for users in all European countries. The unified payment scheme will begin by offering P2P payments by the end of 2023 across France and Germany. In the future, EPI will also offer person-to-professional (P2Pro) payments followed by ecommerce and point-of-sale payments. The scheme will support one-off payments, subscriptions, installments, payments upon delivery, and reservations. Over time, EPI will add in more services such as buy now, pay later, digital identity features, and merchant loyalty and rewards. 

The scheme has a diverse set of shareholders, including BFCM, BNP Paribas, BPCE, Crédit Agricole, Deutsche Bank, DSGV, ING, KBC, La Banque Postale, Nexi, Société Générale, and Worldline. Also worth noting are the newest members. Belfius and DZ Bank joined in 2022, and today, ABN Amro and Rabobank are joining as well.

Photo by Karolina Grabowska

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Fresh Faces at FinovateSpring

Fresh Faces at FinovateSpring
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: FinovateSpring 2023

With new challenges come new opportunities, and fintech has always been at the forefront of creating tools to help consumers, businesses, and traditional financial institutions overcome their obstacles. And given all of the changes taking place in financial services, there’s never been a better time for fintechs to shine. That’s why at FinovateSpring next month, we’ll showcase 50+ fintechs as they demo their newest developments from the Finovate stage.

So far this year, we have 25 new demoing companies. We wanted to highlight them because we figured they might be new to you, as well. Here’s a rundown of the new-to-Finovate demo companies currently on the roster:

1kosmos
1Kosmos automates user onboarding for workers and customers, protecting against stolen and synthetic identities while eliminating ATO and fraud.

9Spokes
9Spokes unlocks the potential of open data, giving financial institutions a powerful set of tools to engage business customers.

AI Squared
AI Squared simplifies and accelerates AI integration to provide increased adoption of AI to impact organizations and lives.

AutoCloud
AutoCloud offers risk management for multi-cloud infrastructure as code.

Bankable Fintech
Bankable Fintech offers an unbiased source for financial technology partnerships, vendors, and service providers.

bluCongnition
bluCognition provides machine learning, deep learning, artificial intelligence, and big data services.

Cloverly
Cloverly provides tools for businesses and organizations to become carbon neutral by connecting online buyers to local renewable energy through its Sustainability-as-a-Service platform. 

Curinos
Curinos’ machine-learning, AI-driven engine, Amplero, allows financial institutions to break free from rules-based marketing and achieve true personalization.

Deception and Data Truth Analysis
D.A.T.A. provides lightning fast and highly accurate analysis of due-diligence documents for their level of deceptiveness and truthfulness.

Deserve
Deserve’s mobile-first credit card platform is fully-configurable and offers cutting-edge card issuing, processing, and underwriting technologies.

FINTEQ & Smart Faktor
Smart Faktor’s FINTEQ is an Early Payments Platform that factors in sustainability. The company’s supply chain financing turns a business’ working capital into profits. 

Finturf
Finturf brings point-of-sale financing to brick-and-mortar retailers and service providers like home improvement contractors and medical offices.

Front Financial
Front Financial offers users real-time, aggregated data from their third party accounts. The company authenticates into over 300 banks, brokerages, CeFi exchanges, or DeFi wallets without screen scraping.

Hyperswitch
Hyperswitch is a payment facilitator-as-a-service that helps merchants connect to any number of and a wide variety of payment processors.

IDMERIT
IDMERIT is the one-stop shop for customer and business verification, helping companies fight fraud and meet KYC and AML regulations.

Kani Payments
Kani Payments offers transaction reporting and reconciliation as well as business intelligence that helps businesses make informed decisions.

ModernTax
ModernTax is API platform that democratizes access to tax records for business services companies.

Pangea Technologies
Pangea’s FX hedging platform powered by AI addresses FX risk and global currency volatility for companies that have global costs, revenue, or employees.

pave.dev
Pave helps credit risk teams to identify healthy borrowers, optimize credit limits, and improve collections outcomes.

PayTic
PayTic offers software-as-a-service that helps card issuers and fintech businesses control risk and compliance through digitizing the payments back-office functions.

Savana
Savana is a core-agnostic digital delivery platform that enables truly frictionless interactions between banks and their customers across channels.

Setuply
Setuply offers a client onboarding automation platform that delivers innovation and experiences for clients and vendors.

The Lazu Group
The Lazu Group is an equity, diversity, and inclusion firm that helps organizations move from intention to impact and future-proof their business model.

Total CollectR
Total CollectR is a white-label solution that leverages AI to help customers resolve delinquent accounts using the communication channels they prefer. 

Wink
Wink enables any institution to offer identity and payments experiences through biometrics.

Be sure to keep an eye out for demo updates leading up to the event, which takes place May 23 through 25 at the Marriott Marquis in San Francisco. Don’t miss your chance to register!

Photo by Kenny Eliason on Unsplash

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Super.com Raises $85 Million for Savings Super App

Super.com Raises $85 Million for Savings Super App
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Funding
  • Super.com raised $85 million in a Series C funding round led by Inovia Capital.
  • Super.com did not disclose its current valuation but said that it has “increased significantly” since 2021.
  • Super.com rebranded from Snapcommerce in October of last year.

Super.com is bringing in an $85 million investment today in a Series C fundraising round that boosts the company’s total funding to $186 million. While there is no update on Super.com’s current valuation, the company noted that it has “increased significantly” since it closed its Series B round in March of 2021.

The round was led by Inovia Capital with contributions from new investors Harley Finkelstein, Deb Liu, Allen Shim, Josh Proctor, Chris Best, Neha Narkhede, and Mike Lee. Existing investors Telstra Ventures, Acrew, Lion Capital, Full In Partners, NBA star Steph Curry, and others also contributed.

“Raising our Series C is proof of investor confidence in our ability to scale the business responsibly. This will allow us to both continue investing in growth while driving improving margins,” said company CFO Daniel Weisenfeld.

Super.com rebranded from Snapcommerce in October of last year and offers a savings app to help users save money, access credit, and find travel experiences. In 2022, the company launched SuperCash, a secured credit card product that offers cashback while helping users build their credit.

In addition to helping consumers track their SuperCash transactions, the Super.com app also offers deals and savings opportunities when purchasing travel experiences and shopping major brands. Since the company was founded in 2016, it has helped its five million customers save more than $150 million.

“Super.com’s diversified business model now drives savings across all facets of our customers’ lives, from travel to fintech. It’s great to see market excitement match our own as we rapidly build the first savings super app focused on everyday Americans,” said Super.com CEO Hussein Fazal.

Photo by Karolina Grabowska

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TransUnion Brings Credit Scoring to the Blockchain

TransUnion Brings Credit Scoring to the Blockchain
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, TransUnion
  • TransUnion has partnered with Spring Labs and Quadrata to bring credit scoring to the blockchain.
  • Spring Labs’ technology will deliver TransUnion-powered data to Quadrata’s Web3 digital passport.
  • TransUnion EVP of Financial Services Jason Laky said the move will “allow for DeFi lenders to have access to this critical information when making their lending decisions with confidence, ultimately minimizing their risk and providing borrowers more opportunity for better terms.”

TransUnion has partnered with two firms to bring credit scores onto the blockchain. The Illinois-based company has tapped data security firm Spring Labs and decentralized networks expert Quadrata to ultimately help lenders make data-driven decisions on credit applications submitted via the blockchain.

The partnership will enable TransUnion to– upon the customer’s request– provide credit data that is not stored on a blockchain to decentralized finance applications (DApps). TransUnion, which holds the consumer credit data off-chain, will leverage Spring Labs’ patented technology that delivers credit scoring data while keeping the consumer’s identity on blockchain secure. Quadrata will leverage its digital passport, a Web3 identity solution that will automatically sync the credit scoring data across the blockchain.

“Credit scoring is an important tool for lenders to help mitigate risk regardless of the platform being used,” said TransUnion EVP of Financial Services Jason Laky. “This partnership with Spring Labs and Quadrata will allow for DeFi lenders to have access to this critical information when making their lending decisions with confidence, ultimately minimizing their risk and providing borrowers more opportunity for better terms.”

DeFi lending platforms have the potential to reach a more diverse set of consumers than traditional lending platforms. Not only do they offer more flexibility when compared to traditional lenders, but they also allow the borrower to customize their loan. Borrowers choose the collateral they provide, the duration of their loan, and the interest rate they are willing to pay.

Bringing credit scoring to the Web3 space will facilitate DeFi lending, lower the risk for DeFi lenders, and increase opportunities for borrowers. “As more consumers and lenders move to blockchain to conduct business, it’s important to ensure that the balance is struck between the information that lenders need to assess risk and the privacy and anonymity expected by users of the technology,” said Spring Labs CEO John Sun. “This new product featuring TransUnion’s identity and credit data at its core is a big step toward achieving that balance and allowing more lending opportunities on blockchain while minimizing risk.”

Photo by Joey Kyber

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FinovateEurope Talks: Open Banking and Open Finance

FinovateEurope Talks: Open Banking and Open Finance
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: FinovateEurope 2023, Marketing

Europe is a leading region in open banking and open finance, and the region’s fintech experts have a lot to say about both topics. While we were at FinovateEurope in London last month, our team set out to gather thoughts on the open banking and open finance environment in Europe and beyond.

In this five-minute video, we feature nine industry leaders who talk about the overall purpose of open banking and open finance, why they are important, and monetization strategies. The clip also addresses customer sentiment– are end users really on board?

Photo by Jill Burrow

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ESG Regulations May Bring Investing’s Green Future

ESG Regulations May Bring Investing’s Green Future
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Thought Leadership

Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) investing has been gaining traction across the globe. PwC reports that ESG is “soaring”, and anticipates that ESG institutional investment will climb 84% to $33.9 trillion in 2026.

The firm states that by 2026, ESG assets under management (AUM) in the U.S. will more than double to total $10.5 trillion. In Europe, PwC expects the amount of ESG AUM will see an increase of 53% to $19.6 trillion. And in APAC, the firm estimates that ESG AUM will more than triple to $3.3 trillion.

What will help drive that change? Regulation.

Regulation

Though the concept of ESG investing has been around for more than a decade, there have only recently been efforts to formalize regulation surrounding ESG disclosure, investment, and ESG practices and financial products. Europe, for instance, has come up with its European Green Deal, a set of proposals to stem climate change, support sustainable innovation, and transition Europe into a climate-neutral continent by 2050.

Europe isn’t the only region with a “green” vision. Here’s a non-exhaustive list of key measures some countries are taking:

Australia
The Australian Government plans to introduce mandatory sustainability and ESG reporting requirements for large businesses and financial institutions based in Australia. The requirements will be put in place in stages and will begin as soon as next year.

The U.K.
The U.K.’s Non-Financial Reporting Directive (NFRD) requires U.K. companies to disclose energy use, carbon footprint, and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions within their annual financial reporting. In 2021, The U.K. Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) released Greening Finance: a Roadmap to Sustainable Investing in 2021.

At the start of 2023, the European Parliament implemented The Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR), policy aimed to enhance transparency in sustainable investing and ultimately prevent greenwashing. Also going live in January 2023 is The Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), an initiative put into place by the European Parliament to broaden the Non-Financial Reporting Directive’s (NFRD) and fix weaknesses surrounding ESG regulation and reporting.

India
By the end of March 2023, India’s top 1,000 listed companies by market capitalization were required to begin filing a Business Responsibility and Sustainability Report (BRSR) to the Securities and Exchange Board (SEBI) of India. In addition to general disclosures, companies need to document their compliance with National Guidelines on Responsible Business Conduct (NGRBCs) and submit metrics on nine ESG factors, including ethics, sustainability, and human rights.

The U.S.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) published a plan to issue a set of reporting standards for ESG in March of last year. As part of the plan, the SEC would require firms to report their climate risks, risk management, ESG governance, and GHG emissions. While the ruling on these proposed mandatory climate risk disclosures is expected to occur this month, SEC Chair Gary Gensler may be considering changes to the plan before it goes into effect.

Also notable is Nasdaq’s Board Diversity Rule that requires companies listed on Nasdaq’s U.S. exchange to publicly disclose board-level diversity statistics each year. If companies fall short of expectations, they are required to explain why they do not have diverse directors.

Canada
Currently, Canadian firms are not subject to mandatory ESG reporting. However, the Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) issued a notice last year stating plans to require large Canadian financial institutions and insurance companies to disclosed ESG efforts and climate impacts starting in 2024.

ESG fintechs

Though some fintechs do not fit the requirements of ESG reporting, many have either incorporated ESG elements into their business or structured their whole business around an ESG element. In fact, according to Crunchbase, there are 300 fintechs with an ESG focus. Check out Finovate’s ESG scholarship winners or take a look at the following notable fintechs emphasizing ESG:

  • Spiral allows banks to increase customer engagement by embedding sustainability and social impact capabilities.
  • Enfuce offers payment, open banking, and sustainability services to banks, fintechs, financial operators, and merchants.
  • Treecard is a green finance platform that allows consumers to spend, save, and invest responsibly.
  • Connect Earth connects carbon data to drive sustainable finance.
  • Single.Earth is a fintech startup tokenizing nature to make it the new gold.
  • Datia is a data platform for sustainable finance, working with forward-thinking financial institutions to automate their ESG workflows.
  • The Upright Project develops an AI-enabled quantification model to measure the net impact of companies and funds.
  • SparkChange provides specialist carbon data that empowers better ESG investment products, risk management, and financial reporting.

Photo by Artem Podrez

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SmartAsset Acquires DeftSales to Help Advisors Grow their Practices

SmartAsset Acquires DeftSales to Help Advisors Grow their Practices
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Mergers & Acquisitions, SmartAsset
  • Financial advice platform SmartAsset has acquired advisor prospect engagement company DeftSales.
  • The company has integrated DeftSales into its SmartAdvisor advisor growth solution, renaming the technology DeftSales by SmartAsset.
  • The new tool helps advisors respond to leads instantly, enabling them to engage warm leads before another advisor follows up first.

Financial advice platform SmartAsset is acquiring prospect engagement company DeftSales this week for an undisclosed amount.

Founded in 2020, DeftSales offers tools that integrate with a range of CRM platforms to automate financial advisors’ business development outreach and provide analytics insights on client engagement. The technology helps advisors respond to leads instantly, enabling them to engage warm leads before another advisor follows up first.

“We are enormously excited to announce the acquisition of DeftSales and we look forward to integrating their solutions with our own SmartAdvisor platform,” said company CEO and Founder Michael Carvin. “The feedback from advisors using DeftSales has been incredibly clear – by automating many tasks, it dramatically decreases the work required to be successful in converting SmartAdvisor prospects into clients.”

SmartAsset has integrated DeftSales into its SmartAdvisor advisor growth solution, renaming the technology DeftSales by SmartAsset. The new solution integrates SmartAsset’s compliant user interface with DeftSales’ automated campaigns and analytics. DeftSales by SmartAsset offers automated emails and text messages, FastCall technology that enables advisors to follow-up on leads while they are busy with a current client, and an analytics dashboard to monitor engagement efforts.

DeftSales Co-Founder and COO James Fason will join the SmartAsset team as Director of Engineering.

SmartAsset has a mission to help people make smart financial decisions. The company’s educational content, calculators, and tools reach 75 million people each month. In 2021, the New York-based company raised $110 million in funding, boosting its total funding to more than $161 million. And the company is still growing. SmartAsset has brought on 27 new hires so far this year.

Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko

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