Scalable Capital Enters Italy, Moojo Secures Pre-Seed Funding; Commerzbank Seeks Crypto Custody License

Scalable Capital Enters Italy, Moojo Secures Pre-Seed Funding; Commerzbank Seeks Crypto Custody License

This week on Finovate Global we’re highlighting some of the fintech news from Germany.

Scalable Capital, a digital investment platform based in Germany, announced the launch of its neo-broker and new cryptocurrency offering Scalable Crypto in the Italian market. The new solution, introduced in December, will enable Italian investors to buy stock, exchange-traded funds (ETFs), popular cryptocurrencies, as well as set up savings plans for free. The company’s Scalable Broker offering will give investors access to more than 6,000 international stocks, with all trades routed through regulated European exchanges to avoid FX fees. Scalable Broker also provides access to more than 1,500 ETFs and more than 1,700 mutual funds. Additionally, Scalable Broker is available in different price configurations: a free version with commission-free savings plans and trading for stocks and ETFs that charges a fee of EUR 0.99 for transactions in other instruments, and a “Prime” version with an additional trading flat rate enabling unlimited trades for a monthly fee of EUR 2.99.

Scalable Crypto enables investors to buy and sell common cryptocurrencies, which are held as securities in the client’s brokerage account. Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, and XRP are among the cryptocurrencies available for trading, each of which is based on exchange-traded crypto products (ETPs) for easy and secure transactions on regulated exchanges.

“The online broker with savings plans and crypto is just the beginning,” Scalable Capital founder and co-CEO Erik Podzuweit said. “Our goal is to introduce our complete investment platform to the Italian market. We will make even more services available to our Italian clients, such as our leading robo-advisor.”

Scalable Capital made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2016 in London.


Moojo, a new startup that helps freelancers, creators, and gig economy workers improve their invoicing process and get paid faster, announced $2 million in seed funding this week. The round included participation from APX, Helvetia Venture Fund, MS&AD, neoteq Ventures, and Red Swan Ventures

In addition to its instant payments and invoicing solutions, Moojo plans to introduce insurance and lending products in the future. The company has partnered with Hiscox to facilitate the development of insurance products.

“The team and their approach to embed insurance into their offering has convinced us,” Markus Niederreiner, CEO of Hiscox Germany, said. “We are delighted to be Moojo’s insurance partner and co-create the next-gen of solutions for the creator and the freelancer economy. We strongly believe in the way Moojo tailors and builds solutions for the community: integrated into their customers’ lives.”

Moojo was founded in 2021 by Amir Djouadi, Christian Engnath, and Utena Treves. The company is headquartered in Berlin, Germany.


Germany’s second largest listed bank Commerzbank announced late this week that it is looking to enter the cryptocurrency space. The company is the country’s first major financial institution to seek a license that would enable it to offer cryptocurrency safekeeping services, as well as create its own cryptocurrency custody solution.

Germany’s new licensing policy for cryptocurrency services went into effect in 2020 and is designed to encourage more regulated financial firms to enter the cryptocurrency market. Commerzbank’s license application appears a year after the institution formed a partnership with Deutsche Börse and Fintech 360X to develop a digital asset trading platform.

Acknowledging the role of the partnership, Commerzbank spokesperson Bernd Reh added that the bank is “pursuing our own digital asset strategy and are also planning our own offerings for our customers in the coming years.” Reh noted that the planned offering is geared initially toward institutional customers.

BaFin, the Germany’s Federal Financial Supervisory Authority, has so far approved four of the 25 applications it has received from institutions seeking crypto custodian status.


Here is our look at fintech innovation around the world.

Sub-Saharan Africa

Central and Eastern Europe

Middle East and Northern Africa

Central and Southern Asia

Latin America and the Caribbean

Asia-Pacific


Photo by Ingo Joseph

Apex Fintech Solutions and Zogo Finance Partner on DIY Investor Education

Apex Fintech Solutions and Zogo Finance Partner on DIY Investor Education
  • Zogo Finance announced a partnership with Apex Fintech Solutions to help promote financial literacy.
  • Clients of the two companies will be able to access more than 450 financial literacy-related educational modules.
  • Zogo Finance won Best of Show at FinovateFall 2019 in New York for its Teen Financial Literacy App.

Zogo Finance, which won Best of Show in its 2019 FinovateFall debut, announced a partnership with Apex Fintech Solutions that will help investors educate themselves on the fundamentals of sound money management. The collaboration will enable clients of both companies to access more than 450 learning modules on investing and financial literacy.

“Millennials and Gen Z are reinventing investing, which requires companies to adapt to their evolving interests, financial aspirations, and educational needs,” Zogo founder and CEO Bolun Li explained. “Apex shares our vision of harnessing technology to create customized, flexible, and accessible learning opportunities to support investors of all types.”

With more than 500,000 users and 180+ financial institution partners, Zogo leverages behavioral economic research – much of it developed at Duke University – to help improve youth financial literacy. The company’s app uses easy-to-comprehend lessons to educate users on complicated financial concepts, and offers rewards and incentives to encourage users to complete the coursework. Users can also earn rewards by taking positive financial actions such as logging into their mobile banking app, visiting a bank branch, or even using their debit or credit cards. Since inception, users of the Austin, Texas-based company’s technology have completed more than 16 million lessons, with the average Zogo users finishing 38 financial literacy courses.

“Our mission is all about democratizing finance through access – and education is a vital part of that,” Apex Fintech Solutions CEO Bill Capuzzi said. “Partnering with Zogo helps us empower our clients and their millions of customers.”

Founded in 2018, Zogo Finance forged 31 new partnerships with financial institutions in the first quarter of 2022. The company has raised $295,000 in funding from investors including MassChallenge and TechStars.


Photo by Pixabay

Finovate Webinar: Great Digital Experiences Can’t Be Bought – They Must Be Built

Finovate Webinar: Great Digital Experiences Can’t Be Bought – They Must Be Built

Great digital experiences can showcase the unique differentiation in your banking products and services. But such great digital experiences can’t be bought – they have to be built. And customers need this great digital experience to choose you to do business with.

However organizations often struggle to assemble the needed development and deployment tools to create these great experiences, and to scale them successfully.

While you may not be able to buy a great digital experience, you can buy the platform on which to build one. This platform is known as a Digital Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS), running in the cloud. The Digital PaaS provides everything you need to reduce the innovation time for cloud-based digital applications, resulting in the ability to iterate quickly and continuously improve the experience.

Watch this webinar, in collaboration with WSO2, to explore:

  • Better techniques to speed up innovation and meet client demands
  • How to simplify the complexity of modern innovation platforms
  • The benefits of the cloud or digital applications, and how to implement a PaaS solution into your strategy
  • Q&A with the speakers, addressing your burning questions and thoughts

Featuring Eric Newcomer, CTO at WSO2 and David Penn, Finovate Research Analyst.

FinovateSpring 2022 Sneak Peek: Finicity, a Mastercard company

FinovateSpring 2022 Sneak Peek: Finicity, a Mastercard company

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateSpring in San Francisco on May 18 and 19. Register today and save your spot.

Mastercard takes the uncertainty out of digital payments with Smart Payment Decisioning Tools. Advanced data analytics and ML make payments faster, more convenient, and safe.

Features

  • Better onboarding experience
  • Reduce ACH returns, failure & fraud
  • NACHA Verification for WEB debit rule

Why it’s great

Mastercard’s Smart Payment Decisioning Tools reduce risk in ACH payments and optimize cost and speed through open banking.

Presenter

Serenie Gagon, VP Product Management
Gagon is an experienced product evangelist with deep expertise in the payments space. Gagon is responsible for strategic vision and payment enablement roadmap through open banking.
LinkedIn

FinovateSpring 2022 Sneak Peek: Illuma

FinovateSpring 2022 Sneak Peek: Illuma

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateSpring in San Francisco on May 18 and 19. Register today and save your spot.

Illuma Shield voice authentication is integrated with Posh Technologies’ Conversational AI IVR for deployment in the contact center.

Features

  • Frictionless account access without PINs, passcodes, or passphrases
  • 24/7 customer service with a user friendly, conversational IVR
  • Better security with biometric voice authentication

Why it’s great

The Illuma Shield voice authentication + Posh Conversational IVR integration improves operational efficiency, security, and customer experience for community banks and credit unions.

Presenters

Milind Borkar, CEO & Founder, Illuma
Borkar brings a background in R&D and more than 50 successful product launches to his role as founder and CEO of Illuma Labs.
LinkedIn

Scott Stinocher, Web App Developer, TruWest Credit Union
Stinocher is a Web App Developer with 10 years of experience in IT and five years of experience in the financial sector.
LinkedIn

Karan Kashyap, CEO & Co-Founder, Posh Technologies
In 2013, Kashyap began his journey at MIT, which included undergraduate and graduate degrees focused on AI, where he was named a Siebel Scholar for his research work.

While he was completing his graduate degree, he began AI and software consulting with enterprises across multiple industries, building a business foundation, and establishing a pathway to the beginning of Posh. Posh now has more than 50 clients across the banking and credit union space with an ever-growing client base and employee roster.
LinkedIn

FinovateSpring 2022 Sneak Peek: Rillavoice

FinovateSpring 2022 Sneak Peek: Rillavoice

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateSpring in San Francisco on May 18 and 19. Register today and save your spot.

Rillavoice offers conversation intelligence software for offline sales and service. Bank branch associates talk to customers face to face. The software records, transcribes, and analyzes their conversations with AI.

Features

  • 2000x more visibility than in-store audits. 100x faster. At a fraction of the cost.
  • Makes branch managers 25x more productive at coaching.
  • Allows reps to improve conversion rates by 30%.

Why it’s great

Rilla is basically an AI coach that doesn’t sleep, eat, or get tired and is always there to give real-time feedback to in-store associates on how they can improve their conversations.

Presenters

Sebastian Jimenez, CEO
Jimenez is the Founder and CEO of Rillavoice. He graduated with a degree in Data Science from NYU and has worked in startups since. He was selected into the Forbes Next 1000.
LinkedIn

Michael Castellanos, Chief Data Scientist
Castellanos developed Rilla’s proprietary machine learning algorithms to analyze in- person audio. He used to work for the Department of Defense developing signal processing algorithms to detect enemy objects from sonar.
LinkedIn

FinovateSpring 2022 Sneak Peek: txtsmarter

FinovateSpring 2022 Sneak Peek: txtsmarter

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateSpring in San Francisco on May 18 and 19. Register today and save your spot.

txtsmarter, the only ecomms compliance surveillance service that collects, encrypts, and archives all iMessage, Android SMS/MMS, WhatsApp, and social chats in real-time mitigating compliance data leaks.

Features

  • Compliant with current e-comms regulations to avoid sanctions and fines
  • Allows employee e-comms supervisions to avoid comms related data gaps
  • Protects company’s brand and reputation from headlines

Why it’s great

txtsmarter is the only company that captures iMessage, Android SMS/MMS, WhatsApp, and others in real-time, retroactively at the root level, without using third-party apps or secondary number protocols.

Presenters

Nuri Otus, CEO & Founder
As CEO and Founder, Otus drives the overall strategic, business, and financial direction for txtsmarter and all interaction with partners, shareholders & investors.
LinkedIn

Sabine Zimmerhansl, COO
As COO, Zimmerhansl focuses on running the company’s operations, including product development, legal and compliance, finance, and strategic marketing, and eComms.
LinkedIn

Fintech, Sustainability, and the Climate Challenge

Fintech, Sustainability, and the Climate Challenge

The news that CarbonPay has launched a new payment card that helps users determine and offset their carbon footprint is a reminder of the efforts that fintechs of all types are making to support climate sustainability.

CarbonPay’s new offering, only available in the U.S. and the U.K., is a prepaid corporate card called CarbonPay Business Ctrl. The card sits in front of a company business account and comes with an administrator dashboard to enable individual card spending limits. Because the solution is a prepaid card, there are no credit checks, interest rates, or repayment due dates for cardholders to worry about. The card includes smart features such as automating offsetting, carbon footprint tracking data, accounting software integration, and expense management.

CarbonPay says that for every $1.50 (or £1) spent using the card, it offsets 1kg of CO2 at no additional cost. CarbonPay has partnered with sustainability-as-a-service platform Ecolytiq to provide carbon footprint tracking.

“The fight against climate change can’t be solved by a handful of people, it requires systemic change and for everyone to take action,” CarbonPay CEO and founder Rory Spurway said. “That’s what inspired us to create CarbonPay, to help people and businesses around the world make a simple, but impactful change which will help us all in the fight against climate change. We turn every transaction into meaningful climate action by automatically offsetting CO2 every time you pay. It’s a simple, but important step towards making a real difference.”

What other “simple, but important” steps are fintechs taking when it comes to climate sustainability? CommerzVentures recently set out nine fields that fintechs and financial services companies have pursued in order to address the climate concerns of customers and clients. Here’s a look at some of the major categories, and the way fintechs are innovating within them.

Carbon Offsetting: CarbonPay’s new prepaid corporate card, mentioned above, is an example of carbon offsetting in fintech. Carbon offsetting involves lowering or removing carbon dioxide and/or other greenhouse gases in one instance to help compensate for CO2/greenhouse gas emissions elsewhere.

Carbon Accounting: Carbon accounting is a key part of carbon offsetting and involves measuring the amount of carbon dioxide or greenhouse gases created by a given process. In the fintech context, companies like Meniga are working with banks like Iceland’s Íslandsbanki to launch solutions that track the carbon footprint of a customer’s spending decisions . Carbon accounting is related to ESG Reporting, which involves the disclosure of information on a company’s environmental, social, and corporate governance. This provides interested investors with the transparency they need in order to determine whether or not a potential investment is consistent with their environmental, social, and corporate governance values.

Impact Investing/Financing: Investment strategies that seek to combine positive financial returns with positive environmental outcomes are referred to as impact investing or financing strategies. Within fintech, a growing number of roboadvisors have sought ways to enable customers to invest in companies – or funds of companies – that have a proven commitment to climate sustainability. Also known as socially responsible investing, digital investment platforms from Betterment to Personal Capital have included these kinds of investing options for their clients.

Sustainable Banking: Sustainable banking involves using ESG criteria to set the policy agenda for otherwise traditional banking. Whereas banks and other financial institutions historically have focused on the balance between risk and return, sustainable banking adds another factor, impacts, to create a third dimension that bank leaders must focus on when running their businesses. The most common example of this in the environmental context is the effort by sustainable banks and financial institutions to invest in renewable energy enterprises while eschewing investment in fossil fuel companies.

Indeed, looking at the Dow Jones Sustainability Index, which features the top 10% of the largest 2,500 companies in the S&P Global BMI based on their long-term ESG criteria, we see that those banks near the top of the list earned their lofty ranking in large part due to their hands-off attitude toward “dirty” energy such as oil and coal. BBVA, for example, secured the top spot this year as the most sustainable bank in the world – along with South Korea’s KB Financial Group. The Spanish bank earned credit for doubling its sustainable finance target and for issuing objectives to decarbonize its portfolio by 2030.

“This recognition confirms the success of our sustainability strategy and encourages us to continue working with the goal of accompanying our customers and society as a whole as they move toward a more sustainable and inclusive future,” BBVA Global Head of Sustainability Javier Rodríguez Soler said in a statement.


Photo by Akil Mazumder

Best of Show Winner Arkose Labs Launches New Fraud Detection Solution, Arkose Detect

Best of Show Winner Arkose Labs Launches New Fraud Detection Solution, Arkose Detect
  • Arkose Labs launched its new fraud detection solution, Arkose Detect.
  • The new offering was formerly an embedded component of the company’s Arkose Protect technology.
  • Arkose Labs won Best of Show at its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2019.

A new fraud detection solution from Arkose Labs called Arkose Detect will help prevent fraud attacks on consumer accounts as well as help businesses boost revenue by providing legitimate users with a seamless customer experience.

“Every company today is operating in the ‘decision economy,’ which is stimulated and fueled by data,” Arkose Labs Chief Product Officer Ashish Jain said. “We designed Arkose Detect to leverage the collective data from the world’s biggest companies so that those hard-to-suss-out fraud attacks can be easily detected. As fraud is constantly evolving, we have an ambitious product roadmap and will continue to innovate to stay ahead of threats.”

Arkose Detect was previously an embedded component of the company’s dynamic attack response solution, Arkose Protect. Now, in the wake of testing with major international businesses, Arkose Detect is being rolled out as its own product. Arkose Detect leverages AI to force fraudsters and cybercriminals to become increasingly sophisticated in their attacks. This raises the cost of their attacks against businesses defended with Arkose Detect, incentivizing fraudsters to go elsewhere.

Additionally, the new solution gives customers a risk score that allows them to adjust their own fraud models to better detect both automated, malicious bots as well as human-driven fraud attacks. Arkose Labs will also share the fraud data collected and analyzed by Arkose Detect with its customers in order to enable them to enhance their internal fraud prevention processes. Arkose Detect features more than 70 raw risk signals and more than 150 pre-built insights culled from Arkose Labs’ global network.

“In just six years, Arkose Labs has grown to boast a portfolio of category-leading customers across financial services, gaming, travel, ecommerce/retail, social media, and technology industries,” Arkose CEO and founder Kevin Gosschalk said. “And this is just an early chapter in our growth story. Our forecasted trajectory is exciting and attracting attention due to the efficiency of our core technology, on which Arkose Detect is built.”

A Finovate alum since its Best of Show-winning demo at FinovateSpring in 2019, Arkose Labs has since partnered with Bugcrowd to launch a private bug bounty program, introduced the industry’s first warranty against credential stuffing attacks, and unveiled a range of “significant updates” to its fraud detection platform including the development of Arkose Enforce, Arkose Insights, and Arkose Detect.

“The latest product enhancements include detection capabilities which are adapted to a world where attackers are spoofing devices and other identifying information,” Jain said when the updates were announced in October. “Customers also have easier access to the multi-layered risk insights that we use in our machine learning-powered decision engine.”

Headquartered in San Francisco, California, Arkose Labs was founded in 2015. The company has raised more than $106 million in funding from investors including the SoftBank Vision Fund 2, M12 – Microsoft’s Venture Fund, and the Sony Innovation Fund, among others.


Photo by Rodolfo Clix

Revolut Turns to Cross River to Power U.S. Expansion

Revolut Turns to Cross River to Power U.S. Expansion
  • Revolut announced a partnership with fintech technology infrastructure company Cross River.
  • The partnership will enable Revolut to offer personal loans to its customers in the U.S.
  • The announcement comes in the wake of Cross River’s announcement that it raised $620 million in March.

International superapp Revolut has partnered with fintech infrastructure provider Cross River to help it build and scale its business in the U.S. The collaboration will facilitate the first personal loans for Revolut’s U.S. customers and, courtesy of Cross River’s technology infrastructure, will be followed by additional credit solutions to be launched later this year.

“At Revolut, we’re building the world’s first global financial superapp so the move into credit and personal loans is a natural next step,” Revolut U.S. Head of Lending Tarun Bhushan said. “Revolut has developed technology to provide loans instantly to approved customers, with no origination fees – so customers can get the credit they need, when they need it.”

In addition to the absence of origination fees, the partnership means that Revolut borrowers will also be liberated from late fees and prepayment penalties, as well. Potential borrowers can also use the Revolut app to check their rates without affecting their credit score. Revolut’s “near-instant” and same-day loan funding solution means that users receive their funds in their Revolut wallet accounts within minutes of approval. Customers can also establish automatic loan repayments using the app’s AutoPay feature.

“At Cross River, we’re always looking for new and innovative ways to provide access to credit,” EVP and Head of Fintech Banking at Cross River Adam Goller said. “Our partnership with Revolut is instrumental in facilitating responsible financial solutions to consumers, and we’re excited to be powering Revolut’s U.S. expansion.”

Loans from Revolut are currently available only to the company’s U.S, customers. Revolut expects to be able to make the personal loans available to all U.S. consumers “in the coming months.”

Revolut’s partnership news comes as the company makes headlines for both personnel moves and expansion into new markets. This spring, Revolut appointed a new APAC General Manager, a new CEO for Brazil ahead of its expansion into that Latin American country, as well as a new General Manager and a new Head of Growth to support Revolut’s move into the U.S. market.

“It’s an exciting time to be joining Revolut as we further establish and grow our brand in the U.S.,” new Revolut General Manager for the U.S. Yuval Rechter said in March. “The pandemic has supercharged the digitalization of banking and Revolut is the best answer for U.S. consumers seeking greater value, transparency, and flexibility in how they manage their money.”

Cross River made fintech headlines less than a month ago with the news of its $620 million capital raise led by Eldridge and Andreessen Horowitz. The funds will be used to accelerate the company’s tech-focused growth strategy which consists of projects in embedded finance – including payments, lending, and crypto – as well as investments in “people and communities,” plans for international expansion, and “bolstering strategic partnerships.”

“Cross River is powering the future digital economy and changing lives by reinventing the way financial services are accessed,” Cross River founder, President, and CEO Gilles Gade said last month with the financing was announced.


Photo by Johannes Plenio

FinovateSpring 2022 Sneak Peek: FinGoal

FinovateSpring 2022 Sneak Peek: FinGoal

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateSpring in San Francisco on May 18 and 19. Register today and save your spot.

FinGoal’s insights platform sits atop digital banking and personal financial data. Premiering at Finovate, their Aggregator Switch Kit allows fintech developers to switch data aggregators in minutes.

Features

  • Coverage: The best, most enriched and open data in the industry
  • Access: Data is shared easily across ecosystems
  • Cost: Better cost structures for aggregation, enrichment and account verification

Why it’s great

Fintech developers should not be hostage to their aggregation provider.

Presenters

Ariam Sium, VP Product
Sium leads Product at FinGoal and uses the tenets of focus and value to govern each product decision made in the rapidly adapting world of fintech.
LinkedIn

Jenn Underwood, Product Analyst
Underwood brings an expertise in personal finance to our product development. Her passion for equitable financial services and value-based savings greatly enriches the UX.
LinkedIn

FinovateSpring 2022 Sneak Peek: LemonadeLXP

FinovateSpring 2022 Sneak Peek: LemonadeLXP

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateSpring in San Francisco on May 18 and 19. Register today and save your spot.

LemonadeLXP is a digital growth platform that helps FIs and fintechs turn frontline staff into digital experts and support customers as they switch to digital banking.

Features

  • Turn staff into digital experts with addictive microlearning
  • Support staff and customers with technology walkthroughs
  • Optimize digital customer experience, grow digital banking business

Why it’s great

LemonadeLXP is the fastest and easiest way to provide staff and customers with the training and support they need to become experts on digital banking capabilities.

Presenters

John Findlay, CEO
Findlay is a serial entrepreneur, a lifelong innovator, and an expert in digital engagement. Outside of work he’s a dad, husband, athlete, musician, and geopolitics nerd.
LinkedIn