S&P Global Market Intelligence rounds up financial technology companies' recent product launches, partnership announcements and fundraising activity, as well as regulatory developments in the financial technology space. For more fintech news, click here.
Top News
Coral Gables, Fla.-based Amerant Bancorp Inc. led a growth funding round investment into financial technology company Raistone, Inc., which provides offerings to help companies better access their cash flows. Raistone will use the funding to expand the development of its finance application programming interfaces, grow its staff and broaden its suite of financial solutions. SenaHill Partners advised Raistone on the transaction.
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Daimler Mobility AG will offer "native" in-car payments through a new global technology partnership with Visa Inc. Starting in the spring of 2022, customers of Mercedes-Benz AG in the U.K. and Germany can make payments using a fingerprint sensor in the car as their vehicles become payment devices through Visa's delegated authentication technology.
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SoFi Technologies Inc. and the Financial Planning Association started a strategic partnership that will give some 19,000 financial planning practitioner members preferred rates and access to a suite of financial solutions, services and educational resources. The initiative marks SoFi's first external foray into the financial planning industry.
Trading and investing
Cboe Global Markets Inc. is planning to launch a new dealer-to-dealer electronic trading platform for on-the-run U.S. Treasurys in the second quarter of 2022. The platform, called Cboe Fixed Income, will be the company's first cash U.S. fixed income product offering.
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Nasdaq Inc. revealed a new dataset that furnishes reliable information into the trading activity of self-directed retail investors in the U.S. equity market. The Retail Trading Activity Tracker tracks stocks and exchange-traded funds traded by individuals, as well as buy/sell ratios per ticker on a daily basis.
Banking and lending
Cody, Wyo.-based Sunlight FCU is now using core and digital technology from Symitar, a division of Jack Henry & Associates Inc.
Payments
Morgan Stanley and American Express Co. unveiled the Morgan Stanley Blue Cash Preferred American Express Card, which gives clients with an eligible Morgan Stanley brokerage account access to the cashback card program of American Express.
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Mogo Inc. revealed a program that lets merchants offer climate-positive bitcoin rewards to customers. The digital payments and financial technology company's first partner is El Mocambo, a music venue in Toronto.
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Voyager Digital Ltd. integrated the Voyager token, or VGX, into the cryptocurrency payment platform of subsidiary Coinify, which offers merchant payment services through a system that allows businesses to accept cryptocurrency online and in retail stores.
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Mastercard Inc. added partners to Mastercard Installments, its buy now, pay later program. In the U.S., the company will work with American Airlines, CSI, Fiserv Inc. and TSYS, and in Australia, it will work with hummgroup and Limepay Pty Ltd.
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Western Union Co. and Mastercard Inc. deepened their decadelong strategic partnership, expanding Mastercard Send integration into Western Union's global money movement network, as well as Mastercard's cross-border services delivery via Western Union Business Solutions.
Data and information management
Financial data platform MX Technologies Inc. now offers guided financial insights with MXinsights and MXwellness within the digital banking solution of Q2 Holdings Inc. MX integrated with Q2 through the latter's partner accelerator program, which is part of Q2 Innovation Studio.
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Wealth management and capital markets firm Echelon Wealth Partners inked an agreement to use the purpose-built private placement software-as-a-service platform of Katipult Technology Corp. With the platform, Echelon can automate and streamline all brokered and nonbrokered deals distributed through its investment advisers.
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ACI Worldwide Inc. launched Omni-Commerce Payment Analytics, a feature that offers merchants the capability to surface payments data gathered through multiple channels within a merchant's payment ecosystem. Through the solution, merchants are allowed to access and analyze large sets of transaction data in real time.
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