• Payroll and compliance company Deel is acquiring digital governance platform Capbase.
• Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
• Deel will leverage Capbase’s expertise to launch a new product dedicated to equity management and issuance.

It has been a week of consolidation in the capitalization table management space. Fidelity announced plans to acquire Shoobx this week, and payroll and compliance company Deel recently unveiled that it is acquiring digital governance platform Capbase.

Deel, which launched as a payroll and compliance platform for international employees and contractors, has acquired one of the biggest players in the capitalization table management arena, Capbase. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Deel will leverage Capbase’s expertise to launch equity management and issuance services that can help businesses operating with legal and tax questions such as taxable events, local laws, required reporting, and more– across 90 different geographic regions.

“We looked at U.S. compliance and realized it was a very, very hard thing to do,” Deel Co-founder Alex Bouaziz told TechCrunch in an interview. “Equity is such an important part of companies, so enabling other companies to grant it across geographies and at scale felt like something we should tackle.”

Capbase was founded in 2018 to help startups manage the complexities of securities transactions. The company’s services range from helping companies with incorporation, setting up their board, purchasing shares, managing their capitalization table, finding funding, and facilitating due diligence for potential investors and buyers. Capbase has raised a total of $6 million in funding.

After the deal closes, Capbase will continue with business as usual, but Deel will leverage the company’s expertise to launch a new product dedicated to equity management and issuance. All of Capbase’s 20 employees will join the Deel team.

San Francisco-based Deel was founded in 2018 and enables companies to hire employees across the globe and pay them in more than 150 currencies. The company was valued at $12 billion last May and has raised a total of $680 million in funding. Deel has made a total of five acquisitions, including this week’s Capbase buy. Deel’s previous acquisitions have focused on payroll, HR, and work visa management.

Photo by Karolina Grabowska

• Robinhood announced that its Robinhood Retirement offering was now available to all eligible customers.
• The company, which offered a waitlist for interested customers in December, said that more than one million people have signed up for the new investment service.
• Robinhood will provide a 1% match for every eligible dollar customers contribute to their Robinhood Retirement plan.

Robinhood, which gained notoriety in recent years as a platform for traders of meme stocks like AMC and Gamestop, announced this week that it is making its Robinhood Retirement offering available to all eligible customers. Unveiled via waitlist in December, the new IRA product offers a 1% match for every eligible dollar contributed – the first and only individual retirement account to do so, according to Robinhood.

Baiju Bhatt, company co-founder and Chief Creative Officer said in a statement: “Systems are failing to catch up to the needs of how many people live and save (or don’t) … We see an opportunity to be a part of the solution, to build products that adapt to the way work and savings will evolve, and ensure people have the tools to control their financial future – just like the way we started.”

Robinhood claims that more than one million people have signed up for the new service via the company’s waitlist. A significant number of these individuals, according to Robinhood, are freelancers and members of the so-called “gig economy,” who often struggle to find solutions to help them prepare for retirement. Robinhood Retirement will enable customers to open multiple Robinhood brokerage accounts and earn a 1% match from Robinhood on eligible contribution dollars. Customers will be able to grow their earnings in tax-free or tax-deferred accounts, and can invest in both stocks and ETFs. The product’s Portfolio Builder feature helps customers build their own investment portfolio, use a custom recommended portfolio, or a combination of both – all without having to pay a commission. Robinhood added that the company plans to authorize options trading in retirement accounts as well – also with no commission or per-contract fees.

“In 2023, Robinhood remains a company fundamentally focused on the unmet needs of the next generations,” Bhatt noted in a blog post announcing the availability of Robinhood Retirement. “No matter how income is earned, we believe the impact of providing long term savings incentives are just as powerful today as they were for our parents’ generation.”

Founded in 2013 by Bhatt and Vlad Tenev, Robinhood offers commission-free trading of stocks, exchange-traded funds, and cryptocurrencies. With total assets of more than $19.7 billion and revenues of $1.8 billion – both as of 2021 – Robinhood boasts more than 22 million funded accounts and nearly 16 million monthly average users as of the spring of 2022. Robinhood is a publicly traded company on the NASDAQ under the ticker HOOD. The firm has a market capitalization of $7.8 billion.

Photo by ANTONI SHKRABA

• Challenger bank NorthOne announced a partnership with The Bancorp Bank to launch real-time payments via The Clearing House’s network.
• NorthOne customers initially will be able to receive real-time payments. The ability to send real-time payments will come with “future updates” the company said.
• With offices in New York and Toronto, NorthOne has raised more than $90 million in funding for its deposit account that helps small businesses and freelancers better manage their finances.

U.S.-based challenger bank NorthOne has teamed up with The Bancorp Bank to launch real-time payments via The Clearing House’s Real-Time Payments network.

NorthOne co-founder and CEO Eytan Bensoussan called the new offering a “huge milestone” for both his company as well as for the fintech industry writ large. Bensoussan also underscored the value of real-time payments to NorthOne’s small business customers. “For small business owners, cash flow and liquidity are paramount,” he said. “By removing payment waiting times, we’re able to free up a frustrating technical bottleneck for our customers, making it easier for them to operate their business efficiently.”

Founded in 2016, NorthOne specializes in helping small business owners, startups, and freelancers better manage their finances. The company offers a deposit account that enables users to view full account histories and manage receipts, and provides automatic categorization of purchases. Users can connect their NorthOne accounts to their POS or payment processor to get paid faster, as well as leverage the account to pay invoices, manage payroll, and send ACH or wire payments.

With offices in New York and Toronto, Canada, NorthOne sees the introduction of real-time payments as a way to help the 61% of small businesses that it says are struggling because of poor cash management. The update announced this week will enable NorthOne customers to receive instant payments. The ability to send real-time payments will come as part of a separate, future update.

This week’s product launch is the latest news from NorthOne, which most recently made fintech headlines with a $67 million fundraising in October. The Series B investment featured participation from both new and existing investors, and brought the company’s total equity capital to more than $90 million.

“50% of small businesses in America fail over a five-year time horizon,” NorthOne co-founder and COO Justin Adler said when the company’s latest fundraising was announced last fall. “And the majority of those failures are due to financial mismanagement and a lack of financial systems and controls. Our team is proud to be able to de-risk entrepreneurship and make starting and running a successful small business accessible to anyone.”

Photo by Pixabay

• Allianz Trade, Santander Corporate & Investment Banking (Santander CIB), and Two have partnered to launch a new B2B buy now, pay later (BNPL) tool.
• The new tool leverages Allianz Trade to protect against the risk of default, Santander CIB for financing, and Two for the BNPL technology.
• The launch comes one year after Santander’s digital consumer bank launched Zinia, a customer-facing BNPL solution.

A new three-way partnership is driving fresh innovation in the BNPL space this week. Trade credit insurance firm Allianz Trade, trade finance bank Santander Corporate & Investment Banking (Santander CIB), and B2B ecommerce payments platform Two have teamed up to create a BNPL tool for large multinational corporations.

Combining each firms’ expertise, the group has created a solution for corporations to offer a buy now, pay later (BNPL) tool for business buyers, enabling them to defer payments at checkout. Created by Two, the BNPL tool supports payments in multiple currencies and leverages Santander CIB for financing to offer sellers payment upfront while facilitating credit terms to buyers.

Allianz Trade protects against the risk of default. The firm will leverage its database that contains information on more than 80 million corporations to instantly assess credit requests via its API, helping Santander CIB make financing decisions instantly. 

“Our solution will be distributed worldwide and aims to allow large corporates to develop their online sales by offering deferred payments to existing and new customers, without being exposed to non-payment risks, while benefiting from immediate and guaranteed payments,” said Allianz Trade Global Head of e-commerce François Burtin. “It is a turnkey solution combining the very best of our three firms, easy to set up and improving both seller revenue and user experience.”

Today’s launch comes one year after Santander’s digital consumer bank launched Zinia, a customer-facing BNPL solution for customers in Germany and the Netherlands.

Founded in 2020, Two seeks to fix the world of B2B ecommerce by offering a corporate BNPL tool. The Norway-based company has raised $3 million in seed funding. “At Two we are obsessed about delivering seamless ordering and buying for B2B buyers while removing and automating the operational processes for sellers,” said Two Cofounder Stavros Tamvakakis. “Business buying is not a one-size fits all and our product streamlines key steps in the journey (e.g. instant onboarding, ordering, underwriting, invoice distribution, payments, reconciliation) so that sellers do what they do best while we abstract the pain points of drop-offs, working capital tie up, risk, and manual work. Our ambitions are at a global scale, so we decided to take our partnership with Allianz Trade further by collaborating with Santander CIB, combining two powerhouses in insurance and banking to create a unique and innovative solution dedicated to large corporates.”

As the demand for direct-to-consumer BNPL tools increases, so will the demand for B2B BNPL tools. Other players in the B2B BNPL arena include Bespoke Financial, TreviPay, and Tranch. These tools rely on business credit and repayment data to mitigate risk, so partnerships with firms like Allianz Trade will prove to be essential in helping B2B BNPL newcomers ensure repayment.

Photo by Pixabay

• Digital banking app for kids and teens, Greenlight, launched a financial literacy game today.
• The game, Greenlight Level Up, is designed to teach financial skills to kids from kindergarten to 12^th grade.
• Only 23 states in the U.S. require schools to offer lessons in personal finance.

Greenlight, a digital banking app for kids and teens, unveiled a financial literacy game today called Greenlight Level Up.

The game aims to teach kids from kindergarten to 12th grade skills that they can use to improve their financial well-being. Many financial skills are not taught in schools. In fact, only 23 U.S. states require schools to teach a personal finance course. Greenlight Level Up offers lessons on earning, spending, saving, investing, managing credit, income, taxes, and more.

The game was crafted by academic and game design experts to keep kids engaged, using coins and stars as rewards.

Schools, teachers, and students can access Greenlight Level Up for free via Greenlight for Classrooms, an online financial literacy library for kids in grades kindergarten through 12. Greenlight for Classrooms will launch later this year.

Greenlight was founded in 2014 and offers a money management platform for families. The company has served five million parents and kids, offering them real-life experience in the financial world with credit and debit cards, along with a tandem mobile app. By using the cards with help from their parents, Greenlight helps kids build skills to manage their earnings, savings, spending, and giving; and empowers kids to learn to invest. In 2021, Greenlight raised $260 million in a round that valued the company at $2.3 billion.

Photo by Jessica Lewis Creative