The Weekly Wrap: all you need to know by Friday COB | Oct 15th
By Gaia Lamperti
The Weekly Wrap is published every Friday and recaps the week’s main stories and deals, as well as upcoming events and announcements. For Prime subscribers only.
The big story
Today, the limit for contactless payments in the UK has increased from £45 to £100. The move follows British consumers’ shift towards card payments started during the pandemic and still ongoing.
“It represents timely action from the industry after the pandemic heightened appetite for contactless, as customers desired safety and efficiency when shopping,” commented Matt Phillips, VP, Head of Financial Services at Diebold Nixdorf UK&I. “This move will widen the consumer usage of contactless payments while keeping a limit that protects their account. Any move that improves the service for customers, while enabling the digital evolution of the UK banking industry is a positive step, and a trend that we hope to see continue across the sector.”
Yet, many retailers’ terminals still need to be updated so, for some, the option will not be available everywhere immediately. Brad Hyett, CEO of payments company phos, said: “As contactless payments become more popular, the finance industry must step up to the challenge of ensuring that merchants are equipped with the right payment solutions to accept payments in a secure, efficient, and simple manner. Those that are too slow to move away from cash as a primary mode of receiving payments will have the viability of their businesses significantly threatened as they won’t be able to compete.”
Also, some fear the new increase might open the way for fraud risks, hence why several banks will allow account holders to set a contactless limit of less than £100 or turn it off altogether.
Deals of the week
- SEBA Bank launches SEBA Earn to enable institutional access to crypto earning economy
- Antler raises over $300 million and expands investment focus to invest up to Series C
- Biz2Credit to invest $100 million in India over next 5 years
- Tipalti to invest £100 million in the UK with London expansion
- Elliptic has raised $60 million in the Series C funding round
- M2P Fintech raises $35 million from Tiger Global
- SmartFi raises $10 million in token sale using ground-breaking financial model
Be on the lookout for
The new promising Swedish FinTech everyone is talking about! Juni is just one year old, but it’s already gone global. The company is aimed at e-commerce and marketing entrepreneurs and last summer has raised $21.5 million dollars in a Series A round of funding, which was expanded yesterday with another $52 million-worth investment by EQT Ventures.
The follow-on investment from EQT Ventures will allow Juni to build their product entirely in-house, in stark contrast with traditional banking platforms, which tend to offer credit solutions from outside partners.
“Everything we do is designed to make life for internet entrepreneurs easier,” said Samir El-Sabini, Founder and CEO at Juni. “We’re internet entrepreneurs too, after all, and before launching Juni, we were in the industry that we cater to today! We understand their pain points and business needs in a way that traditional banking can’t, which in turn means we’re able to offer them a credit product that actually makes sense for them.”
Between March and May 2021, Juni saw its total transaction volume grow almost 500% month-on-month.
Events & appointments
- The Sopra Banking Summit, a weeklong digital festival of FinTech, will start on Monday. IBS Intelligence is proud to partner up with the event which is designed to tackle the biggest issues in the financial sector and highlight the new paths the industry leaders can take. The Summit will feature voices from over 1,500 financial institutions, 100+ FinTechs, and 25+ CxO speakers covering 45 sessions divided into five streams, all focused on strategic issues in banking.
- On Thursday 21st, FinTech For All is also hosting an in-person event, held at Level39’s HQ in London, to offer the opportunity to its members and partners to connect over drinks and nibbles. The evening will be supported by Innovate Finance, FinTech Alliance, Anthemis and the FCA.
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