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Hi all, Julie here.

It really is Friday this time! Phew. Jordan (aka Fintech Bae) and I are excited to be hosting a Holiday Dinner Party at our house tonight. I’m cooking and a few of the guests have informed me that they are gluten free and/or dairy free and/or vegetarian. Wish me luck lol.

Yet another podcast episode was launched this week! Thanks again to Ohad from TrueAccord for coming on to talk about consumer debt trends and how it’s impacting fintech lenders. We’re also thinking about renaming our podcast to something simple like “The Fintech Today Show.” Let us know your thoughts!

Today's Partner, Masterworks

For investors, 2021 was the most dramatic year ever. Inflation hit 30-year highs. Memestocks were born. And, new variants completely disrupted global supply chains.

But while the world was unpredictable, one market wasn’t, and this Fintech startup just got a 31% net IRR for investors.

By using big data, NYC-based investing platform Masterworks.io realized a 31% net IRR from selling a George Condo painting. They’re demystifying one of the oldest and largest asset classes: blue-chip art. Bloomberg calls them the “Robinhood for art”—we just think it makes good sense.

And we’re not alone, the WSJ described the art market as one of the hottest on Earth.

Why Masterworks is valued at over $1B:

• 84% of ultra-high-net-worth-individuals invest in art to diversify their portfolios
• Blue-chip Art prices outpaced the S&P 500 from 1995–2020
• In 2017, a single painting sold for $450 million!

We love Masterworks because their revolutionary alternative investing platform allows everyday investors to add paintings by Warhol, Picasso, and Banksy to our portfolios without spending tens of millions.

The best part? Secondary Market transaction fees are waived for life for all FTT readers. Merry Christmas!​

Company News

Amex x Nova Credit

The two companies are expanding their partnership to cover more immigrants. Now, people from Brazil, Dominican Republic, Kenya and Nigeria who have moved to the US will be able to access the program, which allows customers to use their international credit history to easily apply for personal Amex cards and begin building credit history in the US if they get approved. Side note, here’s a recent profile of Nova’s founder Misha Esipov.

Nubank IPO Update

The Brazilian digital bank raised $2.6B in a U.S. initial public offering priced at the top of a marketed range (which was previously lowered slightly). At the IPO price, Nubank has a market value of $41B based on the outstanding shares listed in its filings with the SEC.

Nubank’s IPO makes it the most valuable financial institution in LatAm. It’s a nice win for Sequoia Capital, which invested $1M in Nubank in 2013 in a seed round and now has a stake that is worth $7.1B at the $9 share price, based on the company’s filings. Other top shareholders include DST Global, QED and Tiger Global. As of September, the company had just under 50M customers.

Plaid’s New Incubator Cohort

Earlier in 2021, Plaid launched FinRise, an incubator program designed to support early-stage founders who are Black, Indigenous, or People of Color (BIPOC). The first round is wrapping up, and the team is excited to announce that it’s going to have two cohorts in 2022 (feels fitting with the year tbh). The core offerings will remain the same, but next year the team will be condensing the program length to five months vs six and the two cohort programs will run back-to-back with the goal of making these programs more tailored to the needs of each cohort. Full disclosure, my very first angel investment was AskZeta and they participated in this program.

Funding and Deals

Rho Raises A New Round

Congrats to the team at Rho! The NYC based startup (which Fintech Today uses) announced a $75M round of funding led by Dragoneer Investment Group. The corporate spend and cash management fintech has now raised a total of $200M+ in equity and debt with a goal of helping SMBs create frictionless workflows across banking, cards and accounts payable. The team said that its annualized transaction volume grew from a little less than $2B in December 2020 to a $6B annualized run rate based on November’s transaction volume.

Stripe Backs Burrata

The new identity startup came out of stealth with a $7.75M from payments company Stripe, and crypto venture firm Variant, with participation from IDEO CoLab, Slow Ventures and more. Burrata is aiming to solve the issue of KYC in web3, a process which in a way can be considered the anathema of decentralization. However, whenever money is involved on the internet, vetting individuals becomes extremely important. Burrata’s idea is to effectively issue digital identity tokens that contain data points, such as identity, credit scores, etc. which will follow users throughout the world of DeFi. Through the use of these tokens, the startup will aim to solve one of the main pain points of web2 - allowing centralized entities to control users' data.

Crypto Watch

Binance Looking At Indonesia

Crypto exchange Binance is talking to Indonesia’s richest family and a state-owned telecom operator to set up a cryptocurrency trading exchange. The new venture would enable Binance to tap into the largely underbanked country of 273M.

India’s Modi Calls for Global Crypto Standard

In further illustrating that India will not soon become a hub for crypto innovation, Prime Minister Modi has called for a global crypto standard to be introduced. His remarks come as the government is set to introduce a bill to Parliament that may effectively ban all private cryptocurrencies in the country, as well as hand out strict jail sentences for offenders. In a country that has seen so much fintech innovation over the past few years, this is a story that we’ll be following.

Polygon Buys Predicate Labs

The crypto platform is buying Predicate Labs, the developer of the Mir blockchain protocol, in a deal valued at about $500M. The move is part of a broader strategy to help expand Ethereum’s capacity and achieve broader adoption. This would also help with high gas fees. Mir has a technology called zero-knowledge rollups that offloads data from Ethereum to reduce fees and to speed up transaction processing.

Together With Fintech Meetup

Need to fill your sales pipeline for 2022? Or meet new partners? Or get funded? Do it all at Fintech Meetup. 30,000+ double opt-in online meetings = 30,000+ opportunities to meet the people who’ll help drive your business forward in 2022! No speakers. No content. Just meetings!

These and 500+ other organizations have already signed up:

• Fintechs including Akoya, Alloy, Alviere, Argyle, Autobooks, Azimuth, BitPay, BlockFi, Botdoc, Certa, Checkout.com, Circle, FISPAN, MANTL, Novi, Nuance, Nymbus, Onyx, Ripple, Signal Intent, Sila, Socure, Synctera, Urban FT, Zero Hash (to name just a few!)
• Banks including Bank of America, Citi, Federal Reserve, Goldman Sachs, HSBC, J.P. Morgan, Santander, Wells Fargo & more
• Neobanks including Dave, First Boulevard, Revolut & Varo Bank and more
• Credit Unions representing 13m members & $210b assets
• Investors including Bain Capital, Commerce Ventures, General Atlantic, Mosaik Partners, Next Level Ventures, Point 72 Ventures, Tribeca Venture Partners, Vestigo Ventures & more
• Networks including American Express, Discover, Mastercard & Visa
• Plus Solution Providers, Community Banks, Tech Cos, Retailers & Merchants, Media and more!

Online, March 22-24. Startup rate available for qualifying cos. Get Your Ticket Now!

​Account Executive at Pilot

​Sales Development Representative, Outbound at Pilot

Pilot launched in 2017 to bring the back office into the modern era. The fast growing startup provides small businesses with dedicated finance experts - which Pilot hires as full-time, U.S.-based employees - who learn the ins-and-outs of their business. It then integrates directly with the billing, banking, expense, and payroll systems customers already use. With a special blend of custom software and expert bookkeepers, Pilot delivers accurate, consistent bookkeeping and financial management and tax services that give entrepreneurs the freedom to focus on their business. The company now has over 1,000 customers and has raised over $170M in financing from Sequoia, Index Ventures, Stripe and more. If you’d like to learn more about these roles, click the links above!

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Julie VerHage-Greenberg is the co-founder of Fintech Today, where she focuses on editorial content and brand. Prior to joining, she was Bloomberg’s first fintech reporter, covering Robinhood from before it was a billion dollar company, breaking the news that Plaid was acquiring Quovo, and interviewing executives on Bloomberg TV and at several large conferences.

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