Hola amig@s fintech,

We hope you had a fantastic week! If you like our content, stay in the loop by subscribing and following us!

🩵 Until next weekend. Até a próxima!

• Lorena

🌐 TWIF Community

🗣️ Channels

📺 Sponsored Content

Take your subscription management beyond basic pause and cancel functionality, and transform your banking app into a command centre for everyday money management. Empower users to cancel, modify, and optimise their bills—right from your platform. See how Atomic makes it all possible. 

📊 Stat of the Week 

Over the past four years, more than 10 million cards were printed in Mexico, driven by banks, fintechs, and digital issuers; this volume underscores rising demand for physical payment infrastructure, creating opportunities for fintechs in card issuance, digital card personalization, card-as-a-service, and fulfillment chains (Source).

📖  Read of the Week

The study “The Internet of Opportunity: Unlocking Financial Interoperability in Latin America” by Finnosummit and Interledger, finds that 63% of payment institutions in Mexico already have the technological infrastructure and 62% have teams prepared to adopt interoperable payments within six months. The main obstacles are regulatory ambiguity and missing pilot use cases—not technical limitations. The report estimates potential savings of US$1 billion yearly in remittance costs, and anticipates that interoperability can drive substantial financial inclusion, particularly in rural regions.

🎙️ Podcast of the Week

💸 Venture Financing

💸 Equity

🇨🇴 Bold, the Colombian embedded finance, raised $40 million to accelerate product expansion across the region. 

🇧🇷 Kanastra, the Brazilian fund platform, raised $34 million from Fidelity and IFC to scale its asset-management and accelerate product rollout.

🇧🇷 Pagaleve, the Brazilian BNPL platform, raised $32 million and is approaching unicorn range per Brazilian press.

🇵🇪 Lemon, the dual wallet that allows you to buy and sell cryptocurrencies with soles, raised $20 million in a Series B led by F-Prime and ParaFi, with participation from DRW Venture Capital, Endeavor Catalyst, Van Eck, Persea VC, Alumni Ventures, Lambda Class and others.

🇧🇷 Lastro, the Brazilian companny focused on real-world asset tokenization, raised $16 million Series A led by Prosus Ventures to scale tokenization and expand product-market fit across LatAm.

🇨🇴 Akua, the Colombian paytech that reduces operating costs for aggregators, acquirers and financial institutions, raised $8.5 million in a Seed round, which was co-led by Flourish Ventures and Cathay Latam.

🇨🇱 Creditú, the Chilean company offering mortgage down-payment and housing credit solutions, raised $6 million in Series A to expand services in Peru and scale its lending program for home buyers.

🇦🇷 Takenos, the Argentine digital wallet for stablecoin payments, raised a $5 million Seed round co-led by Variant and Lattice, with participation from Reverie, North Island Ventures, Refract VC, Gumi Cryptos Capital, Nascent, and Polaris.

Sponsored Content

Want to sponsor a newsletter? See our sponsorship information here or reach out to latam@thisweekinfintech.com. Want to sponsor an event with the TWIF LatAm community?  Check out the FAQ here, send us your info via this form or reach out to latam@thisweekinfintech.com

🤝 M&A - Fintech

🇨🇱 Haulmer, the Chilean platform specializing in SME financing and investment, acquired the prepaid business of Fpay, the digital wallet of Falabella Group, in a move to expand its payments and financial services ecosystem. 

🇧🇷 Creditas, the Brazilian unicorn offering secured lending, auto financing, and insurance solutions, is reportedly negotiating the acquisition of 25% of Andbank’s brokerage and asset management operations in Brazil.

🚀 Product Launches & Partnerships

💻 Fintech

🇵🇪 Krealo, the Peruvian venture capital fund, announced its interest in investing in B2B cross-border payment solutions that leverage stablecoins to reduce transaction costs and enhance efficiency in international transfers.

🇲🇽 Coru, the Mexican startup, launched a suite of AI agents aimed at improving collection process efficiency for financial institutions across Latin America.

🇲🇽 Klar announced the launch of Klar Empresarial to support SMEs in Mexico, offering commission-free accounts, credit products, cashback, and unlimited transfers.

🇧🇷 Nubank Brasil announced the launch of a credit card for teenagers aged 16 to 17, with a credit limit linked to the amount stored in “Money Box,” allowing for parental control and money management oversight.

🇨🇴 Mono, the Colombian company, has integrated with Bre-B, the Banco de la República’s instant payment system, enabling companies to move money instantly and enhance their financial management.

🇧🇷 The Central Bank of Brasil launched a new feature that allows customers to make Pix transfers by sending a photo via WhatsApp. Using AI and optical character recognition (OCR), the system automatically identifies Pix keys and payment amounts from handwritten notes, printed materials or receipts.

🇨🇴 Ramp released new AI agents designed to automate fraud detection and facilitate bill payments. The agents analyze up to 63 data points—such as vendor history, email domains, and account details—and cross-reference Ramp’s database of 45k+ clients to flag suspicious invoices.

🏦 Financial Services & Banking 

🇲🇽 Citi rejected Grupo México’s offer to acquire Banamex, opting instead to proceed with the transaction announced on September 24 and the planned IPO led by Fernando Chico Pardo.

📜 Policy

🇧🇷 Klavi, Trio, and WePayOut have been approved to operate as Payment Transaction Initiators (ITP) under Brazil’s Open Finance framework, enabling faster and more secure payments through Pix.

🇨🇴 The British fintech Revolut secured regulatory approval to establish Revolut Bank Colombia S.A., signaling its formal entry into the Colombian banking market.

📰 Other News 

🇨🇴 HubSpot, the global CRM and marketing automation platform, announced the opening of its new LatAm operations hub in Colombia, reinforcing the country’s growing role as a regional tech and innovation center. 

🇻🇪 Cashea, the Venezuelan startup offering interest-free credit and installment payments for consumers, continues expanding its presence in LatAm, positioning itself as one of the country’s most prominent fintechs amid a challenging economic environment. 

🇲🇽 In Mexico, payment aggregators are strengthening anti–money laundering (AML) measures to comply with new financial transparency regulations. The initiative seeks to enhance transaction monitoring and data verification across digital payment systems, bolstering trust in the country’s growing fintech and digital commerce ecosystem.

📚 Deeper Reads

We don't need more lists: we need a language of our own for talent (ES)

Being a mom and working in technology: between balance, rebellion, and self-worth (ES)

📣 LatAm fintech enthusiasts looking for a new role, check out https://jobs.thisweekinfintech.com

Made in LatAm with 🩵by 

Elena, Digital Innovation Manager at Banco Azteca

Carlos, Research Associate at El Colegio de México

Lorena, Head of Policy for Spanish-speaking LatAm at Tools for Humanity

👍👎 Did you like this edition of TWIF LatAm?  Take a 1-minute anonymous survey here.

Come meet us in person at www.thisweekinfintech.com/events. You can also join our global community on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram.