Hello Fintech Friends,

I've nominally been out of the office this week, but you're never really OOO when things move as quickly as they do in fintech and stablecoins.

We launched our first episode of the Money Code podcast, linked below.

We're also now out of our earlybird tickets for Stablecon 2026. Stay tuned for a big announcement coming soon.

And the news cycle is, of course, relentless. Tether is launching a US stablecoin and opening an office here. WisdomTree is launching new tokenized funds. And multiple fintech companies went public.

For the weekend, we're combining our M&A and fundraise sections into one Saturday newsletter below.

Please find another week of fintech financing events below.

Have feedback for us? Let us know. Find me at @nikmilanovic, @twifintech, and @ndm

Listen of the Week

Is Tempo Stripe’s Libra 2.0? Trade-Offs in Building a Payments Blockchain w/ Simon Taylor

Podcast Episode · Money Code · 09/11/2025 · 56m

Apple Podcasts

Stat of the Week

"In my 6+ years building fintech companies, I've never seen talent and capital flow toward one thing this quickly."

Venture Financing

• Aven raised $110 million in a Series E round at a $2.2 billion valuation to build a “machine banking” platform for homeowners, offering home‑equity‑backed credit cards and entering mortgage refinancing.
• Rainforest* raised $29 million in Series B funding to scale its payments‑as‑a‑service platform built for vertical software companies, challenging Stripe’s model.
• Ume raised USD $21.8 million in a Series B round to strengthen its AI‑native credit infrastructure and help merchants in Brazil build credit businesses.
• HgCapital Trust plc invested GBP 17 million into Payworks, a Canadian workforce management firm that provides payroll, HR, time & attendance, and analytics services.
• Speedchain landed $11 million in funding to streamline construction finance through its platform.
• Kamino landed $10 million to automate finance for midsized firms in Brazil.
• Tetra Digital raised USD $10 million to create a regulated Canadian dollar stablecoin.
• Tot raised €7 million to accelerate digitalization of financial services for Italian SMEs.
• Metal raised $5 million to support its operations (though the article gives less detail about what its platform specifically does).
• Mazlo emerged from stealth with $4.6 million to help nonprofit organizations that fintech has historically underserved.
• Orbii closed a $3.6 million seed round to unlock $1 billion in SME financing by 2026.

Venture Funds

• Accion closed $61.6 million for its second early‑stage fintech fund (rebranded to Accion Ventures) to back companies serving financially underserved people globally, with investments already made in Nigeria, Kenya, Indonesia, and the U.S.

Exits

IPOs & SPACs

• Figure Technology surged $787.5 million in its IPO and jumped ~24% on its Nasdaq debut, valuing the blockchain‑based lender at about $7.6 billion, as it uses its own Provenance blockchain to originate home‑equity loans.
• Klarna went public on the New York Stock Exchange, raised $1.37 billion, priced its IPO at $40 per share, and achieved a valuation of $15.1 billion while its stock surged in early
• Gemini priced its IPO shares at $28, raised $425 million, and surged above its initial price range to list under the ticker “GEMI” with a non‑diluted valuation of about $3.33 billion. The company also secured a $50 million strategic private placement from Nasdaq.
• CoinShares agreed a $1.2 billion SPAC merger with Vine Hill to go public in the U.S., leveraging its position as a leading European digital‑asset manager with ~US$10 billion in assets under management
• Lendbuzz, an auto finance provider, filed for an IPO. The company made $11 million of net income on $173 million in revenue for the first six months of 2025. Lendbuzz has raised over $1b of private equity funding
• SPAC Meshflow Acquisition filed for a $300 million IPO, targeting blockchain‑related operations.
• SPAC QDRO Acquisition filed for a $200 million IPO, targeting the financial services sector.

M&A - Fintech

• GIC and SoftBank Vision Fund weighed selling their stakes in Vietnamese fintech VNLife, which operates digital banking and payments services and could be valued at $1 billion or more.
• SIBS agreed to acquire Polish payments firm ITCARD, gaining control of ~5,500 ATMs and ~181,000 POS terminals to process over 17 billion transactions annually.
• Coinbase acquired the founding team of Sensible to lead its onchain consumer roadmap and enhance DeFi-powered consumer experiences.

M&A - Banks and Financial Institutions

• PNC Financial Services agreed to acquire Colorado’s FirstBank in a $4.1 billion cash‑and‑stock deal to expand its presence in Colorado and Arizona, adding 95 branches and around $26.8 billion in FirstBank assets.
• Monte dei Paschi di Siena (MPS) secured about 62% of Mediobanca in a takeover bid valuing the deal near €16 billion (≈ $19 billion) and set up the departure of its long‑time CEO, Alberto Nagel, as it plans consolidation in Italy’s banking sector.
• Copper Street Capital sounded out potential buyers for its wealth‑management firm One Four Nine, in which it had invested over £20 million, as the firm aimed to consolidate smaller wealth managers and expected to reach EBITDA profitability in the 2025 fiscal year.