Microsoft shelves plans to buy US arm of Tiktok August 2, 2020 A potential sale of video platform Tiktok to Microsoft is reportedly on hold after US President Donald Trump vowed to ban the Chinese-owned app over national security concerns. Tiktok owner Bytedance yesterday told the White House it was seeking a sale of its US operations to Microsoft, in a bid to curb restrictions on the [...]
Monzo flags ‘significant doubt’ over ability to continue as losses double July 31, 2020 Disrupter bank Monzo has flagged “significant doubt” over its ability to continue as a going concern, after doubling its losses during the pandemic. The figures The bank’s losses widened from £47.2m to £113.8m amid a hiring spree, marketing and US expansion. This came even as revenues more than tripled to £67.2m from £19.7m. Monzo lent [...]
Zuckerberg defends Facebook: ‘Companies aren’t bad just because they’re big’ July 29, 2020 Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg is set to tell Congress that “companies aren’t bad just because they are big,” as the world’s biggest social media company today faces a historic investigation into its size and power. Zuckerberg is expected to tell the US Congress that Facebook became successful “the American way, by starting out with nothing [...]
SpaceX investor pours $50m into London tech startup Complyadvantage July 28, 2020 Fintech startup Complyadvantage has closed a $50m series C round, as it seeks to disrupt the way global banks tackle financial crime. The round was led by the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board, which has CA$207.4bn in net assets. It made the investment through its innovation arm, which invests in late-stage tech companies. Existing investors [...]
Curve hires former Paypal exec as first finance boss July 28, 2020 London fintech startup Curve has hired its first chief financial officer as it looks to expand its product and geographic scope. Curve today announced Scott Weller would be joining the banking platform’s executive team. Weller started his career in Blackrock’s private equity group before joining Paypal as a finance director. There he played a pivotal [...]
British fintech investment slows as venture backers remain cautious July 27, 2020 Investment in the UK’s top-performing fintech sector slowed by more than a third in the first half of 2020, as investors held onto their cash during the pandemic. However funding levels still gained 22 per cent on the second half of 2019, as UK venture capital investment in fintech reached $1.84bn across 167 deals in [...]
Sowing the seeds for the next stage of fintech success July 27, 2020 Fintech in the UK has grown at breakneck speed. In 2010 it accounted for just four per cent of venture capital investment in the UK. A decade later, this figure has risen to 28 per cent, with a record $4.9bn of capital investment landing in the UK in 2019 — a year-on-year increase of more [...]
Revolut snaps up another $80m from Brewdog backers July 24, 2020 Revolut has raised a further $80m to close out its series D funding round from TSG, a Silicon Valley private equity firm that has backed the likes of Brewdog, water brand Voss and Smashbox Cosmetics. The $80m is in addition to the $500m in funding that Revolut announced earlier this year, taking its total amount [...]
Klarna restricts lending rules during lockdown July 20, 2020 Fintech lender Klarna said it has tightened its lending criteria during the coronavirus pandemic. Its vice president Luke Griffiths said Klarna is only accepting new customers that it believes will repay on time, and is increasing the frequency with which it reviews its acceptance criteria. “[Klarna’s] default rate is less than one per cent and [...]
Monzo relaunches premium accounts in third profit-chasing attempt July 16, 2020 Monzo is today relaunching its paid-for Plus account, in a near complete overhaul from its previous iteration that was scrapped last year. The new account will utilise open banking rules to allow users to view and move money from different bank and credit card accounts within the Monzo app, in a direct challenge to fintech [...]
