“Nearly all Visa cardholders can now use Flux’s Offers platform to take advantage of retailer offers including instant cashback. Previously Flux Offers were only available through specific integrations with banking apps like Barclays, Monzo and Starling, today through a partnership with Fidel API that is changing. Fidel is giving Flux the ability to link nearly any Visa card to its Offers platform, meaning millions more shoppers can take advantage even if their bank doesn’t have a relationship with Flux.“

“Volume , the one-click checkout startup, has partnered with open banking infrastructure provider Yapily to reduce the $100 billion being paid by customers annually in hidden and unnecessary fees at online checkouts.  The partnership underpins Volume’s Transparent Checkout, the UK’s first one-click solution to enable direct “account-to-account” (A2A) payments between consumers and merchants, without the need for payment processing intermediaries and expensive third-parties. Currently, merchants have to pay between 2% and 8% of every sale to these card, ewallet and BNPL facilitators — costs that are ultimately paid by consumers in higher prices.”

“The Finnish Financial Supervisory Authority has today on 18 March 2022, approved a supplement to the Finnish language merger and listing prospectus of Evli Bank Plc (“Evli”) prepared for the issuance of merger consideration shares to Fellow Finance Plc’s (“Fellow Finance”) shareholders and applying for the new shares to be issued in connection with the merger to be listed on the official list of Nasdaq Helsinki Ltd (the “Merger Prospectus”).”

“We’re pleased to announce that PayTrace was recently acquired by North American Bancard. North American Bancard processes more than $45 billion in transactions annually for hundreds of thousands of satisfied merchants. PayTrace is becoming their preferred gateway solution for all merchant types.”

“Doxo , the innovative, all-in-one bill payment platform, today announced that it has raised $18.5M in a Series C round led by San Francisco-based Jackson Square Ventures , with continued participation from other existing investors. The investment will help further the expansion of the company’s all-in-one bill pay platform that empowers consumers to improve their financial health. The raise will also be used to hire additional talent, to expand doxo’s bill pay provider directory , and to further accelerate the company’s doxoDIRECT platform that helps billers receive direct electronic payments, fast and free.”

“Sokowatch , the African e-commerce company leveraging innovative technology to transform the informal retail supply chain, has today announced the close of a $125 million Series B equity round, the largest venture financing round ever raised for a non-fintech startup in Africa. Led by Tiger Global , the world’s largest venture capital firm, and Avenir Growth Capital , the round includes participation from a host of leading names including VNV Global , Binny Bansal (Co-Founder of Flipkart ) and Sujeet Kumar (Co-Founder of Udaan ), as well as existing investors Quona Capital , 4DX Ventures and JAM Fund .”

“brush365 , a group of Dallas area dental clinics, today announced its partnership with FeatherPay , an Atlanta-based healthcare fintech company.  brush365 will use FeatherPay to power their patient payment experience, giving their patients greater transparency and flexibility in how they pay for dental care.”

“Today, a startup is coming out of stealth with a solution that it believes makes the work of creating, managing and (when needed) modifying those payment processes easier. Payrails has built what its CEO and co-founder, Orkhan Abdullayev, describes as the “operating system for payments,” and it snagged a seed round of $6.4 million led by Andreessen Horowitz to prepare for the official commercial launch later this year.”

“Blockchain start-up ConsenSys has raised $450 million in a new round of funding that more than doubles its valuation to $7 billion. The cash injection was led by ParaFi Capital, ConsenSys said Tuesday, with Microsoft , Japan’s SoftBank and Singapore’s Temasek also joining as new investors in the company.   New York-headquartered ConsenSys was founded in 2014 by Joseph Lubin, a co-founder of Ethereum. Ethereum is the blockchain platform behind ether , the world’s second-biggest cryptocurrency.”

“Rutter , a fast growing startup that is building a universal commerce API or “Plaid for Commerce” announced that it has raised a $27M Series A financing round led by a16z. Kristina Shen from a16z will be joining the board. This round also includes participation from new and existing investors including Comma Capital, Basis Set Ventures, Haystack, Mischief Capital (CEO of Plaid), The Chainsmokers and founders and executives from Plaid, Modern Treasury, RedHat, Airwallex and more.”

“Playter , a London-based growth platform that helps startups scale quicker with buy now, pay later (BNPL) invoicing, has today announced the closing of $1.7m in seed funding. The round was co-led by global investment firm Fin Capital and 1818 Ventures, with participation from award-winning venture capital RLC Ventures, and investment network Angels. The funding comes as Playter has grown over 1,000% in size and revenue in recent months and is using the injection in capital to sustain growth in the coming months.”

“AiFi is building its reservoir of capital and stepping up ties with retailers as it competes with other companies making strides in the frictionless checkout space — including Amazon, which has been rolling out its Just Walk Out technology to an increasing number of stores. The startup, which has installed its technology at retail facilities operated by retailers including Aldi South, Carrefour, Compass and Zabka, has focused on deploying its equipment to grocery stores, sports venues and universities, and said its system can handle locations as large as 10,000 square feet.”

“Israeli fintech company Rapyd has reached a valuation of $15 billion. Calcalist has learned that the company was valued at this figure in several secondary deals over recent months in which early investors sold shares. Rapyd’s investors include BlackRock, Fidelity, General Catalyst, Target Global and Spark Capital. These recent secondary deals make Rapyd Israel’s highest valued private tech company and highest valued fintech company.”

“Stilt , the leading provider of financial services for immigrants, today announced it has raised $14 million in Series A funding led by Link Ventures , with participation from Petrushka Investments, Hillsven Capital, Gokul Rajaram, Claire Hughes Johnson (COO, Stripe), Ott Kaukver (CTO, Checkout.com), Rahul Vohra (CEO, Superhuman), Josh Buckely, and others. Stilt also has closed on a new $100 million debt facility for lending to its loan customers, bringing its total raised to $375 million in equity and debt financing.”

“Glean AI says it wants to take things a step further with automation that it says will give companies a way to pay invoices faster and reduce manual work while also analyzing line-item data. That analysis, according to Katzenberg, can provide companies with valuable insights and provide more context around their spend.”

“Visa (NYSE: V) today announced it has completed its acquisition of Tink – an open banking platform that enables financial institutions, fintechs and merchants to build financial products and services and move money. Through a single API, Tink enables its customers to move money, access aggregated financial data, and use smart financial services such as risk insights and account verification. Tink is integrated with more than 3,400 banks and financial institutions, reaching millions of bank customers across Europe.”

“Branch , which aims to power faster payments to contract workers with its technology, has raised $75 million in a Series C funding round that has closed just six months after it announced its last financing round.”

“Stax , an all-in-one payments platform, today announced its latest funding raise of $245 million. Led by sibling co-founders Suneera Madhani, CEO, and Sal Rehmetullah, president, Stax celebrates this significant milestone at a time when less than three percent of venture capital goes to minorities and less than one percent of venture capital goes to businesses with women of color CEOs.”

“PPRO , the leading provider of digital payments infrastructure, today announced the acquisition of Alpha Fintech , a next-gen payments technology company. The deal will expand PPRO’s offering, strengthen its presence and networks in Asia Pacific (APAC), and allow it to deliver products and services faster to its customers.”

“Zeta, a banking tech unicorn and provider of next-gen credit card processing to banks and fintechs, and Mastercard today announced a 5-year global partnership. As part of the agreement, the firms will go-to-market jointly to launch credit cards with issuers worldwide on Zeta’s modern, cloud-native, and fully API-ready credit processing stack. Mastercard has underscored the partnership by making a financial investment in Zeta.”

“Africa has it different. It’s not a predominantly card continent. Telecoms and banks lead the majority of online financial transactions carried out in the region via mobile money wallets and bank accounts . But here’s the challenge: While both systems tend to work well when users make transactions within their unique environment, there’s no interoperability for transactions between them.”