Fintech Focus For October 20, 2021

Quote To Start The Day: “Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.”

Source: Confucius

One Big Thing In Fintech: Mexico repeatedly tops most innovative fintech hub lists, and neobank and digital wallet transactions are consistently increasing — during COVID lockdowns they rose by an estimated 80%.

Source: TechCrunch

Other Key Fintech Developments:

• 24/7 BTC ETF trading launches.
• WonderFi raises with an offering.
• Galaxy added $350M in funding.
• Intuit taps Money by QuickBooks.
• Airwallex added on $200M round.
• Sublime raises $2.5M in funding.
• X1 launches “smart credit” limits.
• Plaid overhauled Plaid Link SDK.
• Major raised $17M in new round.
• CRED valued at $4B post round.
• Intuit intros Money by QuickBook.
• Facebook pilots Novi w/out Diem.
• BSO is enhancing trading routes.
• Lydia AI secures $8M in Series A.
• Chargebee releases integrations.
• StoneX unveils Prime Direct offer.
• Chainalysis taps NYDIG on BTC.
• Liberty Bank selects Glia service.
• Regulator pressures N26 growth.
• Polygon, DraftKings partnered up.
• Lydia AI secures $8M Series A+.
• HSBC eyes launch of BaaS offer.
• Query.AI closes on $15M funding.
• Pismo raised $108M in Series B.
• PRIMER secures $50M Series B.
• Republic raises, eyes new offers.

Watch Out For This: Euroclear alongside several institutions has successfully completed an experiment which tested central bank digital currency (CBDC) for settling French treasury bonds on a test blockchain.

Source: The Trade

Interesting Reads:

• Vaccine mix-and-match to come.
• Food shortage next supply issue.
• Democrats eye deal on economy.

Market Moving Headline: We cannot remember a week with so much evidence that our longstanding “anti-transitory” US inflation view is correct, but the Fed has interpretive precedence over us. Q4 is starting out in risk-on mode, which is reasonable, but expect a noisier 2022.

Source: Nordea