Fintech Rundown: A Rapid Review of Weekly News

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Bluefin, Coinbase, Finastra, Fintech Rundown, Worldline

FinovateFall 2026 is in the books! A huge thanks to all who attended our annual autumn conference. If you missed it, check out the companies that won Best of Show, and stay tuned for our wrap-ups and top takeaways in the weeks to come.

For now, we're catching up on the latest in fintech news and announcements, including a major fundraising in the Buy Now, Pay Later space and continued innovation in agentic commerce. Be sure to check back with the Fintech Rundown all week long for updates!

Payments

Bluefin announces expanded Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) support across its payment security infrastructure.

Payments and banking hub xpate launches new API-based capability xpate Pro to enhance money management for digital businesses.

Wealth management

AI-powered portfolio management platform for financial advisors Pave Finance raises $15 million in Series A funding.

Trade finance

Finastra teams up with digital trade finance platform provider…

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FinovateFall 2026 Best of Show Winners Announced!

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Best of Show, Clockout, equipifi, FinovateFall 2026, Goodbuy, Neural Payments, ScreenSteps, Tweezr, Vertice AI, Young Early Starters

The demos are done and the votes have been counted: congratulations to the winners of Best of Show at FinovateFall 2026!

It is true that AI continues to be the most enabling technology in fintech, bringing new capabilities to payments, fraud prevention, lending, wealth management, and more. As one demoing company representative noted from the FinovateFall stage this week, there may not have been a single demo that did not in some way acknowledge the role that AI—and increasingly agentic AI—is playing in helping banks and other financial institutions become more efficient and more effective in serving individuals, families, businesses, and communities.

That said, if there is one commonality among the companies that won Best of Show at this year's FinovateFall, then that commonality might be a laser-focus on what matters most to financial institutions large and small: growing deposits, boosting customer and membership growth, creating new revenue opportunities, and…

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Finovate Global: Meet the International Alums of FinovateFall 2026

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Finovate Global, FinovateFall 2026

This week's edition of Finovate Global is a hat tip to the companies from outside the US that are traveling to New York to demo their latest fintech innovations live on stage at FinovateFall 2026.

It is true that our European conference tends to feature the highest proportion of non-US companies. That said, FinovateFall is a popular destination for emerging and established fintechs looking to showcase their solutions to an audience of banking and financial services professionals and decision-makers.

Get to know our dozen international fintechs below—and be sure to catch them on stage next week at FinovateFall!

FinovateFall 2026 comes to the Marriott Marquis Times Square in New York, September 9 through 11. Tickets are still available, so visit our registration page and save your spot, book your room, and join us next week in New York!

3 Degrees—United Kingdom

3 Degrees enables community banks…

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FinovateFall 2026: The Need to Knows Before You Go

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: FinovateFall 2026

With FinovateFall 2026 less than a week away, there's not much time left to make your last-minute preparations before the conference begins on September 9 (September 8 for those lucky delegates attending one of our exclusive Leaders+ or Credit Union Spotlight pre-events!).

We're looking forward to hosting more than 2,000 senior-level decision-makers, including more than 1,000 from banks and financial institutions, and more than 300 from credit unions and community banks. Add to that our full, 72-demo roster and a slate of insightful keynote speakers and panelists, and we're on track to deliver one of the best FinovateFall conferences to date.

To help you make the most of your experience, here's a handy guide of need-to-knows before and during your time at FinovateFall next week. We'll see you at the Marriott Marquis Times Square in New York!

Connect Yourself

The first step is to download the ConnectMe app from…

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EMVCo Releases Framework for Card-Based Agentic Payments

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news

EMVCo released a draft framework for card-based agentic payments designed to promote secure, interoperable, and scalable transactions involving AI agents.

The framework introduces Intent Services, a shared layer that would help payment participants register, retrieve, reference, and update consumer-authorized intent as it changes over time.

EMVCo is exploring additional agentic payment capabilities, including Know Your Agent (KYA) and Agentic Transaction Indicators, while seeking industry feedback on the draft through September 30.

Global technical organization EMVCo released the draft of a new framework to help promote secure, interoperable and scalable agentic payments. 

Much of the conversation around agentic commerce has centered around the liability that occurs when an AI agent makes a purchase on the consumer's behalf. EMVCo has discovered that, in agentic payment scenarios where intent needs to be managed over time, such as recurring purchases, cumulative budgets, and post-transaction activities, users may need to offer access to a…

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Finzly Unveils AI Assurance Layer Assure

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Finzly

Banking transformation company Finzly has launched its AI-powered security and assurance layer Assure.

Assure provides banks and other financial institutions using Finzly's BankOS with AI-powered security, compliance monitoring, and operational resilience that is native to the infrastructure they rely on.

Headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, Finzly is a two-time Best of Show winner. The company most recently demonstrated its technology at FinovateSpring 2022.

The latest product launch from banking transformation company Finzly weaves security and continuous assurance natively into the infrastructure its banking customers rely on. Assure, Finzly's newly released security and assurance layer, is part of the company's Agentic Galaxy suite of AI capabilities, which powers BankOS, its modern operating system for banks. Financial institutions using BankOS will benefit from Assure's AI-powered security, compliance monitoring, and operational resilience that is native to the infrastructure they are currently using.

"Banking is entering a new era where attacks happen…

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Cross Border Money Transfer Outfit Félix Raises $200 Million

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Félix, Funding

Cross-border money transfer and top-up firm Félix Pago (Félix) has raised $200 million in combined equity and debt funding.

The equity component, in the amount of $87 million, was led by Andreessen Horowitz. The General Catalyst Customer Value Fund provided a $113 million credit facility.

Félix will use the funding to scale its existing remittance business and to support the expansion of its product suite to include lending and savings. The Miami, Florida-based company made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2025 in San Diego, California.

Cross-border money transfer startup Félix Pago has secured $200 million in Series C funding for its technology, which leverages WhatsApp to offer a conversational remittance experience for Latinos and Hispanics living in the US. The round consists of $87 million in equity funding led by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and a $113 million credit facility from the General Catalyst Customer Value Fund. The equity portion also…

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Tyfone Acquires ATTUNE for Account Opening and Loan Origination Solutions 

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Mergers & Acquisitions, Tyfone

Tyfone is acquiring ATTUNE to add consumer and business account opening, deposit funding, loan origination, and servicing capabilities to its digital banking platform.

The deal gives Tyfone a role earlier in the customer lifecycle, allowing it to support financial institutions from acquisition and onboarding through lending, payments, servicing, and ongoing digital banking.

The acquisition advances Tyfone’s evolution into a broader end-to-end banking technology provider, building on its history in mobile banking, payments, and multichannel digital banking.

Digital banking solutions company Tyfone is doubling down on its account opening and loan origination operations with the acquisition of New York-based ATTUNE.

Tyfone anticipates the acquisition will expand its platform with consumer and business account opening, deposit funding, loan origination, and servicing capabilities. Overall, the acquisition will allow the Oregon-based company to extend its digital experience from the first interaction through the entire, lifelong engagement. Additionally, Tyfone will use ATTUNE…

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Lenvi Launches ALVIN to Fight Double Pledging Fraud

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni profile, Lenvi

UK-based lending technology provider Lenvi has unveiled its new automated loan verification software, ALVIN, designed to combat fraud risks such as double pledging. The launch follows a series of high-profile fraud cases involving MFS, Tricolor, and First Brands Group.

Double pledging takes place when a borrower uses the same asset as collateral to secure multiple loans from different lenders simultaneously—without informing the lenders that the collateral has already been pledged as security for other loans. This fraud tactic drew significant public attention this year when a number of high-profile fraud cases involved double pledging.

For example, Market Financial Solutions was a UK property lending company that collapsed in February 2026 as a result of a £1.3 billion fraud and double pledging scandal. Executives at Tricolor Holdings were accused of running a massive fraud scheme—also using double pledging—around subprime automobile loans and were charged by the SEC in August in…

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SettleMint Integrates Ripple Custody into Digital Asset Lifecycle Platform

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Ripple

SettleMint has partnered with Ripple to integrate Ripple Custody into its Digital Asset Lifecycle Platform (DALP), bringing custody, issuance, compliance, settlement, and servicing together on one platform.

The partnership expands Ripple’s institutional digital asset footprint while strengthening SettleMint’s ability to offer financial institutions an end-to-end platform for managing tokenized assets.

The tie-up reflects tokenization’s shift from experimentation to implementation, as banks increasingly need integrated infrastructure to move digital asset initiatives into production.

Digital asset lifecycle management company SettleMint has entered a strategic partnership with blockchain solutions company Ripple to help banks custody, issue, and manage tokenized assets.

SettleMint will integrate Ripple Custody, Ripple’s institutional-grade digital asset custody infrastructure, with its own Digital Asset Lifecycle Platform (DALP), a composable digital asset lifecycle platform built for financial institutions, market infrastructure operators, and sovereign entities. DALP brings issuance, compliance, custody, settlement, and servicing onto a single platform, allowing financial institutions to manage the…

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MeridianLink Acquires Credit Mountain

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Credit Mountain, Mergers & Acquisitions

MeridianLink announced its acquisition of financial wellness platform Credit Mountain. Financial terms were not disclosed.

The acquisition will help MeridianLink launch its Pathway solution, which helps community financial institutions provide declined borrowers with a personalized pathway to loan approval.

Credit Mountain won Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2024 in New York.

As FinovateFall 2026 approaches, we're sharing news from FinovateFall alumni to give you a sense of the kind of companies that will be demoing their latest innovations live on stage September 9 through 11.

Consider Credit Mountain, a financial wellness platform that won Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2024. Earlier this month, MeridianLink, a software platform provider for financial institutions and consumer reporting agencies, announced its acquisition of the company. In a statement, MeridianLink said that the acquisition will support the launch of its MeridianLink Pathway, which enables…

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What’s Trending at FinovateFall 2026?

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: FinovateFall 2026

We officially have 72 demos on stage at this year’s FinovateFall conference, taking place September 9 through 11 at the Marriott Marquis in New York (book now!). This year's lineup is a nice mix of startups with established players, and with all demos running on a single track, you won't miss a thing. This concentrated format makes it easy to spot the patterns shaping bank roadmaps for the next 12 to 18 months.

Here's a look at what trends lie ahead, based on what we're seeing across this year’s demo companies.

AI gets to work

It will come as no surprise that AI is the most prominent enabling technology on the FinovateFall stage this year. What's more interesting is that this year's demo companies are showing that the industry has evolved its use of AI to tackle specific jobs that are expensive, repetitive, time consuming, or difficult to…

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