Ayelen Denovitzer

KOY 2.0 recently launched the KOY Advance Phase 1 with the $KOYN Early Bird Event a few days ago, offering early adopters a chance to swap their EOS, TLOS, WAX, or USDT (on EOS) tokens for $KOYN. As Africa’s first Decentralization-as-a-Service (DaaS) provider, KOY 2.0 is set to transform the landscape of decentralized innovation. $KOYN is the native token of the KOY 2.0, essential for accessing a suite of DaaS solutions that include smart contracts, secure data management, and more. With $KOYN, businesses can streamline their operations and participate in a thriving ecosystem that supports growth and innovation in the digital age. Early participants are able to acquire $KOYN at an attractive price of $0.05 per token, with a cap of 50 million tokens. What makes KOY 2.0 unique is its comprehensive suite of secure, scalable, and intuitive solutions tailored for African enterprises. The platform supports sectors such as fintech, paytech, IotT, greentech, and AI, acting as a launchpad for transformative applications. The tokenomics are straightforward, with a clear and predictable staking rewards system that ensures regular distribution from a dedicated pool, fostering trust among $KOYN holders. To participate in the Early Bird Event, participants needs to select their preferred blockchain (EOS, TLOS, or WAX), prepare their tokens, and send them to the account ‘koyadvancesw’ on their chosen blockchain. One has to include their destination public key/account in the transaction memo. Transactions are processed within 24 hours, and progress can be tracked through the KOY Network block explorer. The event features a tiered bonus system to incentivize larger swaps, offering bonuses of up to 25%. The swap rates are final and non-refundable, with acquired $KOYN tokens staked and vested for six months or until after the exchange listing. Running for two weeks, this event provides a limited opportunity to secure $KOYN tokens and join the KOY Network revolution. Stay updated by joining the KOY Jumuiya DAO Telegram Community chat and become part of Africa’s decentralized future. #KOYv2 #KOYJumuiyaDAO #KOYJumuiya

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Plaid Layer is an incredible experience but gives me heartburn -- Not because the product is bad, but because the conversion metric shouldn't be the only one. Plaid has launched Layer, a new service that allows users of finance products to get through KYC by simply entering their phone numbers. This aims to reduce onboarding to 15 seconds and deliver 17.5% higher conversion at onboarding. 1. Users enter their mobile number, and 2. If the Plaid network has data that makes them eligible to onboard, they can "instantly sign up." 3. Plaid performs fraud checks (like looking at the user's device) and 4. Then allows users to confirm what details they want to send. 🧠 As an industry, we desperately need portable KYC. KYC and onboarding are stuck in the analog era, pulling SSNs and asking for selfies. It's an expensive, leaky bucket that can be easily beaten by deep fakes and stolen data from the dark web. Pulling data from trusted sources (like another financial institution) bound to a device or telephone number is potentially more effective and a much better experience. 🧠 This is a fraud product masquerading as an onboarding product, and that's smart. The way to get the best possible fraud vs friction tradeoff is to do as much passive data detection as possible at onboarding. Looking at the user's device, email, and mobile history, with various two-factor authentications like SMS or passkeys, can add a ton of security. Plaid having that in their network and as a part of the onboarding sell is really good packaging. 🧠 Do you know how to get 100% conversion at onboarding? Let all the bad guys in. Look, I love this innovation, I love this product, and I get that Plaid is doing very clever things with data behind the scenes to actually make this potentially better than collecting an SSN and selfie at onboarding. All of that said, there's a reason a lot of sponsor banks are under consent orders for KYC/AML failings. We treated onboarding as a conversion problem, not a good customer conversion problem. Can we, as an industry, measure and benchmark that too? Even anonymously? All of that said - you have to love the execution here. Plaid are damn good at what they do. #fintech #kyc #fraud

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#OpenAI is raising $6.5B in equity capital at a $150B pre-money valuation ($156.5B post-money) and is in talks with top banks on a $5B credit facility, ostensibly for CAPEX investments in equipment and chips. Only ByteDance and SpaceX are larger private tech companies --- Fascinating use of the balance sheet strength of a bank: Investing in AI startups through credit, with options for in-kind services and funding for critical hardware like chips, presents a strategic opportunity for banks to capitalize on technological innovation while securing long-term value through operational efficiencies and competitive advantages. 1. Strategic Capital Allocation: Offering credit to AI startups allows banks to tap into a high-growth sector with the potential for disruptive innovation across industries, positioning themselves for long-term benefits. 2. Dual Repayment Structures: AI firms can repay in the form of services, such as predictive analytics and risk management tools, allowing banks to improve operational efficiency and build stronger, lasting partnerships. 3. Capital Investment Value: Even if loans aren’t repaid in cash, the AI services provided can have multi-year value, benefiting banks by reducing risk and providing higher returns through potential equity-like outcomes. 4. Future-Proofing the Industry: By staying ahead in AI, banks protect themselves from disruption, cut operational costs, and develop new, data-driven financial products that enhance competitiveness. 5. Supporting AI Innovation: Early financing gives banks access to the latest technological advancements that will influence industries beyond finance, such as healthcare and manufacturing. 6. Competitive Advantage: Structuring loans to accept in-kind services gives banks an edge in leveraging cutting-edge AI technologies, setting them apart from competitors. 7. Funding for Essential Hardware: AI firms need specialized hardware like GPUs and TPUs to train models. Banks can allocate part of the loan to help secure this hardware, enabling startups to scale faster and mitigating risks by securing physical assets in supply-constrained markets. 8. Hardware as Collateral: Hardware-backed loans reduce default risks, providing tangible assets that retain value. This adds another layer of security for banks when financing early-stage AI firms. 9. Enhancing Bank Infrastructure: Banks can use hardware financed through these loans to build their own AI capabilities, offering more sophisticated products and reducing costs through AI-driven efficiencies. By combining in-kind repayment, hardware financing, and long-term innovation, banks reduce risk, support AI sector growth, and improve their own technological capabilities, making this a highly strategic use of capital. https://lnkd.in/gY9zHbUk

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🤪 💵 Wow, this is so wrong... Bolt (not the ride-hail company Bolt, but another one) had a revenue of $30 million (2021) and raised a total of $960 million. Pay attention here—its valuation was an astonishing $11 billion, which was... 400 times its annual revenue (yes, 400!) 🤯 To put the scale of the problem into perspective, even assuming a 30% net profit margin (which is rare on the market), investors would need to wait over 1,000 years to see money back 😱 👉 But the story doesn't end there. It gets even more interesting. Unsurprisingly, given this insane valuation, there are lawsuits and scams happening in parallel. So, what did the founder do with a company that has $960 million of investor money, an unrealistic valuation, and modest growth? Naturally, he took a personal loan of $30 million secured by Bolt (meaning if he doesn’t repay the money, Bolt will cover it). Cool, no? Predictably, the $30 million wasn’t repaid, and now Bolt shareholders are suing the founder. However, they will get more Bolt shares, not money 😜 It sounds like a very strange, partial exit strategy from an overinflated balloon 🎈 Of course, a high valuation can be justified for a truly unique product that solves a significant problem for humanity (space exploration, unique medication etc.) However, Bolt is a payment provider (you can personally find 30+ competitors with a quick search) that was growing at a modest 20%. 😱 How did this happen? How was such an overhyped valuation accepted by experienced investors? And how did the founder have the moral right to execute the loan scam? It’s just crazy... https://lnkd.in/dBV5r5Yc https://lnkd.in/dfjK2cJV https://lnkd.in/duKYMKYc. #valuation #exit #bolt

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Rainforest lands $20M to challenge Stripe with embedded payments for SaaS providers Rainforest, a startup that embeds payment processing into other software platforms, has raised $20 million in Series A funding — less than a year after announcing the close of its seed financing. Raising back-to-back rounds was more common in 2021 but we don’t see it happening as often in this new environment. Rainforest’s traction is likely what helped draw new investor Matrix Partners as well as returning backers Accel, Infinity Ventures, BoxGroup, The Fintech Fund, Tech Square Ventures and Ardent Venture Partners. In total, the company has raised $31.75 million. In the past six months alone, Rainforest says it has grown its payment volume by 17x, signing on “dozens” of platforms across a variety of industries. The two-year-old Atlanta-based company also claims to have increased its valuation “by more than 2x” but declined to share specific numbers. CEO and founder Joshua Silver describes Rainforest as a payments-as-a-service provider that helps software companies “build and optimize” embedded financial services. It’s hardly alone in its mission, but Silver contends that his startup does it in a way that helps its customers make more money while being purpose built for SaaS companies’ specific needs. Rainforest is a Stripe alternative that allows software providers to facilitate payments from end customers to their business clients. For example, a software platform for residential roofing contractors would enable payments from homeowners to roofing contractors. Rainforest claims that it is different from the competitors that already do this (such as FIS, Fiserv and Stripe) because it’s designed specifically for SaaS companies and offers white-glove service. “There are too many payment products akin to fast food — they fill you up, but you’re sluggish, not nourished. Same for a SaaS,” Silver told TechCrunch. “Software companies can increase revenue per customer by 2x-5x by adding fintech, earning more revenue from embedded finance than from their core product. But that’s only possible when it’s fueled the right way.” Competitors, he found, were usually large modern processors or PayFac providers, all with DIY service models. And none were built directly for software platforms — rather, they were designed with merchants in mind. “None of the modern processors were built specifically for software platforms. Most of them were built directly for merchants, and they’ve all had to retrofit their platforms even to accommodate basic payment processing and reporting functions for software companies,” Silver told TechCrunch at the time of Rainforest’s last raise. As a result, he said, Rainforest is capturing volume as software platforms migrate from legacy processors such as Fiserv and FIS. Subscribe for more news https://lnkd.in/d94JgWBU Source Techrunch #payments #fintech #cardpayments

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💣 Nearly HALF 5X+ VC funds are small funds sub $50m - I posted this last Christmas and tagged the 2 top emerging managers backing FoFs in Europe. Little would I know that by final closing time I'd be so fortunate and grateful for having both on board :) Data for the stats from Pattern Ventures, proving that emerging small funds smash larger, established funds. Now we just have to deliver and score a 5x+ pice of cake haha 😹 But hey, what would life be without a tough challenge 💪 #deeptech #europeantech #venturecapital #emergingmanagers Molten Ventures Multiple Capital

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I think Stripe is one of the top fintech companies in the world and we can learn a lot about how they developed their #API products Stripe’s payments APIs: The first 10 years 🔸 Supporting card payments in the US (2011-2015) 🔸 Adding ACH and Bitcoin (2015) 🔸 Seeking a simpler payments API (2015 - 2017) 🔸 Designing a unified payments API (late 2017 - early 2018) 🔸 Introducing PaymentIntents and PaymentMethods (2018) 🔸 Launching PaymentIntents and PaymentMethods (2018 - 2020) ✅ An API product is more than just the API There has—and will always be—many lines of code propping up the vaunted “seven lines of code.” It’s reliably the case with APIs. They don’t happen without a lot of work that isn’t designing or building the actual API. Much of the effort required is unglamorous and tedious, like tracking down every piece of documentation, support article, and canned response that references the old APIs, reaching out to folks who have made community content and asking them to update it, and planning and recording many tutorials for users and user-facing teams. There’s also the teams that appear on the periphery, but are instrumental in the success of APIs. There’s the documentation and developer products that supplement the integration experience. Stripe CLI’s launch made webhooks much less daunting. A redesign of the information architecture of our documentation made relevant guides easier to find. Stripe Samples allows developers who prefer to learn by example rather than prose to just start with some working code. A redesign of the payments view in the Stripe Dashboard allows developers to more easily debug and understand the PaymentIntent state machine. The care, choices, and effort of Stripes past and present from across the company contributed to our most recent two-year effort to design and launch our new payments APIs. The more we grow, the more we realize that we must continue to build and rebuild deliberately and thoughtfully. These are still early days. Source Stripe #fintech #payments #api Brice Ali Alex Grant Nafis Monica Lex Theodora Saleh

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Asset-based secured lines work really well for teams that need liquidity to bootstrap their products. The borrowed tokens are used as collateral while also being used productively (e.g. creating liquidity for a new product launch). This is highly capital efficient - from a borrower's perspective they are receiving an undercollateralized loan, but from a lender's perspective the loan is overcollateralized. Win-win.

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Stripe has acquired Bridge in one of the largest crypto valuations in history…. This is further evidence (not that anyone with a brain needs it) of the change coming in our financial lives. Stripe is a payment processing platform that allows businesses to accept credit and debit cards or other payments online. Bridge allows businesses to create, store, send and accept stablecoins which some have referred to as the Web3 answer to stripe. This year the firm received $58milion in funding from firms like Sequoia. SOLA Group have a number of interesting projects in the #Web3 space and also looking at assisting some startups with capital raising in this space also. The change in financial landscape is here, and you can either watch it pass you by or invest and benefit from it.

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There's a lot of buzz about stablecoins in the fintech community right now. But we're just scratching the surface of what fintechs will achieve. If the opinions of this cohort of leaders are anything to go by, stablecoins are back on the agenda. In this report, we spoke to leaders at different points in the payments value chain: stablecoin issuers like Paxos, embedded banking providers like ClearBank, B2B payments fintechs like Freemarket and VCs like General Catalyst. We asked: how are you thinking about stablecoins and what progress will be made this year? Here are a few things they told us: - Market timing is a challenge we need regulators, banks and governments to come on board. But with stablecoins we’ll find the next category-defining business. - Traditional financial institutions (FIs) are experimenting. When they see clear ROI, they’ll start rolling out stablecoin rails to other countries – this will be a pivotal moment for market readiness. - Stablecoins will reach a market cap of $250bn by the end of 2024, growing 2-3x the pace of the crypto market overall. - Providers with the right licences will be in a stronger position to launch stablecoin products and offer those to other FIs. - By the end of 2024 we’ll see some marquee partnerships where traditional fintechs are launching a full stablecoin solution, wallets pay-ins and payouts. For those thinking about adding stablecoins to their tech stack, I hope this collection of views, along with summaries of use cases, can provide some useful perspectives. https://lnkd.in/dh7ZAfg2

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Today’s shoutout goes to Griffin.  A bank you can build on. And their founders, David Jarvis & Allen Rohner. Griffin, the UK's rising BaaS (Banking-as-a-Service) star. Just leveled up in a big way! Here's what makes them stand out: 1/ Going from startup to fully licensed bank. They just secured a full banking license. Proving their operational excellence and regulatory compliance. 2/ Focus on sustainability. From "light green" investments to a dedicated sustainability manager. Griffin walks the walk on ESG. 3/ New opportunities ahead. Griffin secured an additional $24M in funding. This brings their total capital to $39M for continued growth. Griffin is no longer just a sandbox player. They're building castles! My full shout-out note is in the latest EUVC newsletter. Link in comments. 🔽 How about you? Let's show our appreciation more often! Leave your shout-out to a product you love in the comments section! #venturecapital #angelinvesting #startupfunding #europe

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Global Fintech Investments at QED Investors I'm often asked about our approach to fintech investments. Here are my notes from recent media interviews and presentations to our investors (LPs). Full interview link in comments. What sets us apart is our truly global outlook. We believe great ideas can come from anywhere, so we don't restrict ourselves to specific regions. This open-minded approach has led us to discover and support innovative fintech companies worldwide. At QED, we specialize in fintech. We've built our global fund structure to bring together experts from around the world. This allows us to offer founders not just capital, but also valuable global insights, perspective and network. When we look at potential investments, we're searching for the best opportunities globally. What do we look for in a company? We focus on three main things: solid unit economics, the potential for exponential growth, and high-quality founders. We pay special attention to how founders think about regulations. In the complex world of finance, understanding and adapting to regulations is crucial for success. One of the most important traits we look for in founders is prudence, especially when it comes to regulations. We want to work with people who understand what regulators are trying to achieve and can innovate responsibly within those boundaries. The best founders not only understand current rules but can also anticipate and adapt to future changes. We know that building a great fintech company takes time. That's why we're patient investors. Over the past 16 years, we've invested in more than 225 companies. Thirty of these have become what we call "unicorns" – companies valued at over a billion dollars. But we don't just focus on these high-value companies. We're committed to supporting all our investments through their various stages of growth. Most of us at QED have experience building and running fintech companies ourselves. As investors, we offer founders not just capital, but also valuable insights as ex-operators of banks, financial services companies and consumer technology companies. We understand the challenges our portfolio companies face because we've been there ourselves. It allows us to offer practical advice and support, especially when companies hit rough patches. Our approach combines a global viewpoint, careful selection of investments, understanding of different markets, focus on regulatory compliance, patience, and hands-on experience. We believe this strategy puts us in a strong position to find and nurture the next wave of innovative fintech companies around the world. QED Investors, VCCircle #Fintech #VentureCapital #GlobalInvesting #Startups

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Thrilled to personally participate in the $1mn seed raise of Electron that is building a universal zk-proof aggregation layer for Ethereum, alongside LambdaClass, @Zephyrus Capital, Blue7, Interop Ventures, Founderheads, Router Protocol and super angels including Sandeep Nailwal, Martin Köppelmann, Jaynti Kanani, Anurag Arjun and others. The high cost of proof verification on-chain in Ethereum can result in millions of dollars of infrastructure costs, even for new projects. #ProofAggregation emerges as the ultimate solution for elastically scaling on-chain proof verification. It has the potential to slash proof verification costs by over 99.9%, saving builders hundreds of millions annually. Electron aspires to become the de-facto "method" for verifying proofs on Ethereum. They're already collaborating with tier-1 partners like Polygon Labs, Gnosis , LambdaClass, Avail, Biconomy and several others. Notably, Electron's superproofs, currently live for Cosmos Network: Internet of Blockchains are already demonstrating a 98% reduction in verification costs. You can explore them here: https://lnkd.in/dZYWEEJ2

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🚨𝘽𝙄𝙂 𝙉𝙀𝙒𝙎: Stripe announced that it will be de-coupling payments — the jewel in its crown — from the rest of its financial services stack. 𝗕𝘂𝘁 𝘄𝗮𝗶𝘁, 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝗶𝘀 𝗺𝗼𝗿𝗲: This is a big change, considering that in the past, even as Stripe grew its list of services, it required businesses to be payments customers in order to use any of the rest. It signifies a shift in how Stripe views its wider platform: In the past it took the approach that the launch of other services could help lure users to taking its payment services; now it appears to be willing to explore how it can sell some of those other, non-payments services on their own. Alongside this, the company is adding in a number of new embedded finance features and a new wave of AI tools. The updates were unveiled at Sessions, Stripe’s big developer event in San Francisco, where the company said it would be announcing more than 50 (❗️) new features on its platform, part of a slate of more than 250 (❗️) that have been announced so far this year. “Our mission is to grow the GDP of the internet. Our strategy is to listen carefully to the needs of the most sophisticated and innovative businesses in the world,” said Patrick Collison, the CEO and co-founder of the company, at the event. “This year, because of our scale, Stripe is well positioned to help our users deal with the increasingly complex payments landscape and put AI to work to drive growth. We’re also making Stripe more modular, so companies can use just the parts of Stripe most useful to them.” Check out the video below for the Opening keynote by the Collison brothers, and William Gaybrick, where they explain more👇 Also, more info here: https://lnkd.in/eiUDjeV5 And here is a roundup of the Stripe Sessions event product announcements: https://lnkd.in/gUwbznRH Find this helpful? [ 𝗿𝗲𝗽𝗼𝘀𝘁 ] Anything to add about this subject? [ 𝗶𝗻𝘃𝗶𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 ] Nice story, Marcel. Next! [ 𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲 ] #payments #paytech #digitalpayments #stripe #paymentindustry #fintech #fintechindustry #financialtechnology #fintechnews John Collison

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It would be amazing if someone could create a post detailing the unit economics of a fintech business. Gross profit margins, payback periods, LTV, and so on. Maybe even compare different types of Fintech startups, BNPL, payment processors, lenders, etc.

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Beware of investing in Reg A crowd funded startups. Many are abusing the process... — Aptera has been telling investors for three years that it would soon deliver its first solar-powered car but still hasn’t shipped any [raised $120 million from 17K retail investors] Tiny-house maker Boxabl says its wait list exceeds 175,000 customers, but it has sold only six units this year, according to its most recent disclosures. [raised $100+ million]   The SEC approved the exemption nearly a decade ago, as part of an effort to make it easier for smaller companies to raise capital. Known as Regulation A, the technique allows businesses to annually raise as much as $75 million while complying with lighter-touch rules than a traditional initial public offering. These companies have raised billions of dollars from hundreds of thousands of Americans with little oversight. Link to full expose source below. #startups #crowdfunding #regA

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NAVER Corp Q2: Operation profit +26.8% to ₩472.7B. Revenue +8.4%. #Fintech(NAVER FINANCIAL) TPV +20.1%. NAVER Cloud revenue +19.2% on #AI growth. HyperCLOVA X development is ongoing. #Tech #Earnings https://lnkd.in/gc396swE

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Would a Nubank copy-paste work in Africa? Probably not (at least right now). "LATAM is similar to the US: credit-cards are understood, widespread. Credit cards as a product are supremely powerful. Users can seamlessly borrow and spend. It’s a gold mine for the issuer, and it’s (in part) what made Nubank so successful. A small survey estimated that 58% of Latin Americans have credit cards. In Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, the figure stands at around 1.6%. Any African neobank play has to start with contextually-relevant products, like someone’s first proper bank account." Read the full Realistic Optimist piece by Hassan Bourgi, co-founder of Djamo here: https://lnkd.in/gSb4TNfB

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