Sovra raises $2m+ pre-seed round

By Milan Rojan

Sovra, a FinTech platform offering a self-custodial global dollar account, has raised more than $2 million in a pre-seed funding round as it prepares for launch.

The round has been led by Pharsalus Capital, with participation from a group of regional and global angel investors including Naguib S. Sawiris, chairman of Orascom Development Holding AG; Karim Atiyeh, co-founder of Ramp; Hisham Al-Falih, founder of Lean Technologies; and Hany Rashwan, founder of 21Shares.

Ahmad Wehbi, founder and chief executive of Sovra, said, “There has always been something between people and their money; a bank, a border, a fee, a policy, a form. The technology to remove the middleman now exists. Sovra is the simplest way in. That’s not a company policy alone, but the architecture we have built for Sovra.”

The capital raised will be used to support engineering and product development as the company readies its public rollout. Sovra has said its waitlist is now open, and it operates with a distributed team across the Middle East and Europe.

Anthony Ghosn, managing director at Pharsalus Capital, said, “By giving people sovereign, self-custodial alternatives to fragile fiat and banking systems, Sovra is helping restore financial dignity in Lebanon and beyond. For those of us with ties to the region, these issues are deeply familiar — and Ahmad and the Sovra team stand out for having the courage and clarity to build where others have been constrained by the scale of the problem.”

The platform allowS users to hold, earn, spend and send digital dollars through a mobile app. Dollar balances are held in USDC, a US dollar-backed stablecoin issued by Circle, which Sovra has described as regulated, audited and backed one-to-one by reserves. Users have also been able to access third-party decentralised finance protocols for yield, make card payments across the Visa and Mastercard networks, and transfer funds between accounts without fees.

Sovra has said it is targeting young professionals across the Middle East and North Africa, university students and the regional diaspora globally.