Know What's Happening in FinTech
Know What's Happening in FinTech
FinTech Pulse
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Every morning
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Big tech firms are pouring billions into AI infrastructure across Africa, with Microsoft, Google, AWS, Oracle and Meta each launching multi‑billion‑dollar projects. Microsoft’s $1 billion geothermal data centre in Kenya and $285 million South African expansion illustrate its aggressive stance, while Google is constructing four AI‑optimized hubs linked to subsea cables. AWS pledged $1.7 billion for South Africa’s data‑centre capacity, Oracle opened an OCI region in Nairobi, and Meta is deploying edge sites in Nigeria and Ghana. These investments target both compute power and local talent development.
Stripe’s 2025 acquisition of Bridge was intended to power a dollar‑backed stablecoin layer for faster, cheaper cross‑border payments. The Information reports that Bridge’s APIs were used in transactions linked to online scams and U.S. sanctions‑listed parties, prompting fresh compliance scrutiny....
Sea Global FX has launched a new CFD brokerage platform that prioritizes transparent execution, system stability, and trader education. The service routes orders through external liquidity providers and publishes detailed execution policies and pricing structures. Operating under a St. Lucia registration,...
KAI Exchanges has launched the “KAI New Year Carnival: New Plans, Full Rewards Unlocked,” a month‑long promotion running from Jan 29 to Feb 28 2026. The campaign offers guaranteed‑reward draws for every qualified participation, covering Bitcoin, token prizes and USAD contract trial funds....
The episode examines the fallout from Synergy’s sudden shutdown of its restaurant gift‑card program, leaving consumers with worthless prepaid cards and highlighting the lack of consumer recourse when such issuers fail. It details Costco’s voluntary refunds, despite no legal obligation,...
Neo Financial announced a CAD 68.5 million equity round led by Canadian institutional investors such as AIMCo and Northleaf. The funding coincides with the launch of a securitization program that will bundle its credit assets to generate liquidity, a practice common among...
Crypto.com unveiled OG, a CFTC‑registered prediction‑market platform for U.S. users, offering contracts on sports, elections, finance and entertainment events. The service, powered by Crypto.com Derivatives North America, introduces margin trading on prediction contracts—a first for a publicly launched market. Co‑founder...
Know Your Customer (KYC) marks its 10th anniversary as one of the few RegTech firms from the post‑2008 era still thriving. Founded in 2015, the company built a platform that pulls real‑time, registry‑sourced corporate data from 146 jurisdictions, delivering authoritative...
Naveen Rudraradhya, an IAM veteran with an MBA in IT Business Management, led a global identity and access transformation that unified standards across regions while respecting local regulations. He replaced manual request channels with a single, automated portal linking HR...
VistaShares introduced BTYB, an actively managed ETF listed on the NYSE that blends U.S. Treasury securities with Bitcoin‑linked exposure. About 80% of assets are invested in Treasury instruments while the remaining 20% is generated through a synthetic covered‑call strategy using...
The UK asset‑management regulatory landscape continued evolving in 2025, moving from policy design to concrete implementation. Zeidler Group published a guide outlining the latest FCA supervisory priorities, ESG disclosures, consumer‑duty rules, and governance expectations. It also highlights infrastructure reforms such...
At the 2025 Central Park AI Forum, leaders debated whether enterprises should buy or build AI solutions, especially for legal and regulatory functions. Speakers highlighted that building tools often fails to deliver long‑term ownership, as maintenance and continuous updates are...
PayPal reported a modest 1% Q4 growth in its branded‑checkout payment volume, a sharp deceleration from the prior quarter, and its shares fell 18% on the news. The earnings release also announced a leadership transition, with board chair Enrique Lores...
Neutral is a DeFi platform that generates yield through market‑neutral strategies, balancing long and short positions via basis trading and funding‑rate arbitrage. The protocol operates on‑chain across both centralized exchanges like Binance and decentralized venues, offering eleven active strategies and...
Researchers introduced FedGraph‑VASP, a privacy‑preserving federated graph learning framework that enables virtual asset service providers to jointly detect money‑laundering without sharing raw transaction data. The system exchanges compressed graph embeddings secured with Kyber‑512 key encapsulation and AES‑256‑GCM, delivering quantum‑resistant protection....
U.S. Bank announced that its chief operations officer, Souheil Badran, will retire this spring after three years in the role. The bank has not yet identified a successor and says it will rely on its robust succession‑planning program, with Badran...
Revenue‑based financing (RBF) is moving from a proof‑of‑concept stage to a technology‑driven growth phase. Phase one proved the model using manual underwriting and limited scalability, while major platforms like PayPal and Shopify introduced sales‑linked funding. Phase two replaces static documents...
Australia’s AML and counter‑terrorism financing reforms will take effect on 31 March 2026 for existing entities and July 2026 for a new tranche of roughly 80,000 businesses, including real‑estate agents and lawyers. The amendment Act shifts supervision from checklist compliance to outcomes‑based, demanding...
Payments Canada announced Lisa Ford as its new Chief Legal and Policy Officer, effective February 17, 2026, to strengthen governance and integrate legal, compliance, and policy functions. Ford, a 2023 Women in Payments Thought Leadership Award winner, has shaped key legislation and...
The Malta Financial Services Authority (MFSA) has introduced a new General Code of Conduct aimed at decision‑makers across the financial sector. The code outlines five core principles—integrity, informed decision‑making, accountability, compliance, and fairness—to raise governance standards and ethical behavior. It...
The ECB’s latest SAFE survey shows tightening credit conditions for euro‑area firms, with 12% reporting higher loan rates and 14% facing stricter collateral requirements. Despite the financing squeeze, external funding demand rose modestly and digital payments surged 7.7% to 77.7 billion...
Moody’s reports the global stablecoin market has crossed the $300 billion threshold. Settlement volumes surged 87 % to $9 trillion by the end of 2025. Regulatory clarity from the U.S. GENIUS Act and Europe’s MiCA has spurred 19 new stablecoin launches, primarily for...
World Liberty Financial launched World Liberty Markets, a DeFi lending platform built around its USD1 stablecoin, which now has a circulating supply of about $3.4 billion. The protocol uses smart contracts to let users deposit crypto assets as collateral and borrow...
Standard Chartered’s crypto research head Geoffrey Kendrick projects Solana (SOL) to reach $2,000 by 2030, despite a recent dip to around $100. He trimmed his 2026 price target to $250 from $310 but sees a longer‑term surge driven by stablecoin‑based...
Safello, the Swedish crypto exchange, announced its launch in Finland, a market where roughly one‑tenth of the adult population already holds digital assets. The move introduces local fiat on‑ramps and a native app tailored to Finnish regulatory requirements. Safello aims...
Berlin‑based enclaive closed a €4.1 million seed round led by Join Capital and the Amadeus APEX Technology Fund to accelerate its Multi‑Cloud Platform (eMCP). The funding will boost sales, marketing, product functionality and international expansion. eMCP lets organisations run workloads in...
Zoomex, a global crypto exchange, launched the February XAUT Airdrop Event, rewarding new users with a $10 bonus and XAUT tokens for completing KYC and initial trades. The promotion uses a transparent, task‑based system and requires upgrading to the Unified...
Everyone in the finance media is watching Ondo Summit from @OndoFinance today, Bloomberg, FT, WSJ, Reuters, CoinDesk & more. Last year: 500K+ livestream views. This year is bigger. 2026 belongs to Tokenization We aren't just trading tokens anymore. We are tokenizing the entire...
The Safe Ecosystem Foundation announced that its smart‑account protocol generated over $10 million in annualized revenue for 2025, up from roughly $2 million in 2024, without any token subsidies. The network processed $600 billion in transaction volume—43 % of its total lifetime volume—in a...
Y Combinator announced that, beginning with its Spring 2026 batch, startups can elect to receive the standard $500,000 investment in USDC stablecoins instead of cash. The option, driven by founder demand and the accelerator’s view of evolving financial infrastructure, aims...
Rails announced the launch of Institutional‑Grade Vaults on the Stellar network, enabling broker‑dealers and fintechs to access crypto perpetuals through a single backend. The solution separates the centralized matching engine from on‑chain custody, with client assets held in audited smart‑contract...
MetaMask has integrated Ondo Finance’s Global Markets platform to bring more than 200 tokenized U.S. stocks, ETFs and commodities into its self‑custodial wallet. The feature is limited to eligible mobile users in supported non‑U.S. jurisdictions, allowing them to buy and...
MetaMask is adding tokenized U.S. stocks, ETFs and commodities to its Ethereum‑based wallet through a partnership with Ondo Global Markets. Starting Tuesday, eligible non‑U.S. users can swap USDC for 1:1 Ondo tokens that track the value of 200 underlying assets....
Payments companies such as PayPal, Stripe, Affirm, Revolut and Checkout.com are applying for state and federal banking charters to gain direct access to credit‑card networks and eliminate reliance on partner banks. A special‑purpose charter, first granted to Fiserv, would let...
Fintech powerhouses such as Stripe, PayPal, Affirm, Revolut, Fiserv and Checkout.com are applying for federal or state banking charters. Analysts say the move promises greater control over payment settlement, cost savings and the ability to offer FDIC‑insured accounts. A special...
Thread Bank CEO Chris Black says the surge of crypto and fintech firms applying for national trust charters creates a strategic opening for established banks. He argues that while the charter is commoditized, disciplined capital, liquidity and risk management give...
Payward, the parent of Kraken, reported a 33% jump in adjusted 2025 revenue to $2.2 billion, driven by a 34% rise in transaction volume to $2 trillion. Trading activities generated 47% of revenue, with EBITDA reaching 26% ($531 million). The firm also disclosed...
Fireblocks announced integration with the Canton Network, enabling its platform and NYDFS‑chartered trust entity to custody and settle Canton Coin on a privacy‑enabled, permissioned blockchain. The move lets banks, custodians and asset managers apply existing policy controls and workflow automation...
AI agents are no longer just working for us. They are starting to hang out with each other. Moltbook is a social network where AI bots interact without humans, while real-world data shows agents are mostly used by highly educated workers...
"DATs have no more dry powder. Because mNAVs are below 1, they can't sell equity to buy more tokens." https://t.co/d1Catj17uP
Businesses across e‑commerce and finance rely on global SMS marketing platforms to deliver timely notifications, verification codes, and interactive messages. The guide evaluates providers on reliability, two‑way capability, true global coverage, operational efficiency, and scalable affordability, highlighting ITNIO TECH as the...
The crypto hoarding playbook is starting to crack. Bitcoin below $76k has turned once celebrated treasury strategies into massive paper losses, with investors now fearing forced selling. What was pitched as conviction is beginning to look like leverage dressed up as belief....
wait til folks see @v7labs go is doing already at scale across finance, legal, insurance, tax - not in research preview https://t.co/S8OtBtIsvI
AI‑assisted PDF tools are reshaping how professionals extract insight from dense documents by allowing natural‑language queries, summaries, and clause extraction. Adobe Acrobat leads for broad, everyday use by embedding conversational AI into a mature editing suite, while ChatPDF targets researchers...
This quote from The Information's latest story on Stripe's stablecoin infra subsidiary Bridge is interesting. Seems like Stripe drank the kool-aid. Now the question is, how bad will the hangover be? https://t.co/J2DnaC7z02
Looks like some users of third-party platforms who have interacted w/Kontigo wallets are having their accounts shut down:
Circle announced a 2026 product roadmap centered on Arc, its new Layer‑1 blockchain designed as an Economic OS for web3 finance. The plan expands USDC and other digital assets across multiple networks while introducing the Circle Payments Network and StableFX...
Merchant Rentals, a PayPoint Group subsidiary, has signed a strategic partnership with European Information Technology (EIT) to broaden its payment‑terminal portfolio. The collaboration adds vendor‑agnostic devices from Castles, PAX and Verifone to Merchant Rentals’ financing catalogue, giving merchants greater choice....
Basware announced the appointment of Kira Mondrus as its new Chief Marketing Officer, joining the executive team reporting to CEO Jason Kurtz. Mondrus brings over 20 years of B2B technology marketing experience, most recently scaling Tricentis from $13 million to more than $500 million in...
OneMiners is transitioning from a pure crypto‑mining host to a next‑generation compute infrastructure provider, leveraging its 20 MW Georgia ASIC‑hosting campus and a forthcoming 30 MW gas‑powered data‑center in South Carolina. The Georgia facility offers transparent, tiered electricity pricing starting at $0.060/kWh...
