Ramp lands in Europe via Billhop; Abra is going public via SPAC (TWIF 3/22)

Abra plans to go public via SPAC merger with New Providence Acquisition Corp. III at a $750M pre-money valuation, with up to $300M in trust, to become the first publicly traded SEC-registered digital asset wealth management platform.

PhonePe paused its planned ~$15 billion IPO citing Middle East geopolitical tensions and Indian market volatility, with plans to relist when conditions stabilize. 

Mastercard agreed to acquire BVNK, a London-based stablecoin infrastructure company, for up to $1.8 billion to connect on-chain payment rails with Mastercard's global fiat network. 

Ramp acquired Billhop, a Stockholm-based B2B payments platform, gaining its UK and Sweden regulatory licenses to directly onboard European businesses to its financial operations platform. 

FinVolution Group acquired Australian digital lending platform Fundo, marking the China-based fintech's first developed market expansion.

Kredivo acquired Timo, a Vietnamese digital bank, to expand the Singapore-based BNPL platform's footprint into Vietnam's digital banking market.

NCR Voyix agreed to sell its Japanese bank technology unit to NTT DATA, a local IT services provider, divesting its FX, lending, and video teller solutions for Japanese financial institutions.

Perpetual, an Australian financial services company, agreed to sell its wealth management arm to Bain Capital for an initial AUD 500 million (~$350million), expected to close at the end of 2026.

Société Générale agreed to sell its retail custody and account keeping unit to Crédit Mutuel Arkéa via its ProCapital subsdiary, refocusing on wholesale securities clients.