Welcome to TechCrunch Fintech (formerly The Interchange)! In this issue, I’ll look at some of the successes and missteps in real estate fintech, Carta’s missteps (again), and more!
To get TechCrunch’s roundup of the biggest and most important fintech stories delivered to your inbox every Sunday at 7:30 a.m. PT, Subscribe here.
big story
Equity management platform Carta is in the news. . . again. It’s not for good reasons. again. One high-profile client accused Carta of misusing sensitive information entrusted to the company by startups to further its own goals. The claim raises broader questions about how Carta operates, although Carta has argued that the incident was isolated and led to the company shutting down its secondary trading operations. So how is Carta doing now? Rebecca Szkutak digs deep. Meanwhile, Alex and Anna believe Carta’s growth story is being overshadowed by the chaos surrounding its stock trading.
Analysis of the week
The real estate fintech space continues to experience its ups and downs. We started the week with the news that Here, a short-term vacation rental marketplace we first reported on in 2022, had shut down its investment platform after more than two years in operation. The company claims it’s alive, but we’re not sure what’s left. Even though so many companies in the industry are struggling or failing, investors are not giving up.
This week I also reported on DownPay’s mission to help investors purchase new properties with no interest down payment.
Finally, we looked at Overmoon, which also has a unique model, being a hybrid of Airbnb and a hotel, but with the best of both worlds. Listen to more of the Equity team’s discussion of Overmoon here:
dollars and cents
Startups in Latin America continue to attract venture capital. We reported on two raises in the district:
Conta Simples secures another $41.5 million for its expense management approach in Brazil
Prometeo raises $13M from PayPal, Samsung and more to bring open banking to Latin America
Meanwhile, in Africa, YC-backed African fintech Cleva, founded by Stripe and AWS alumni, raised $1.5 million in pre-seed funding
And, in the U.S., Pier raised $2.4 million to launch Stripe for Credit
What else should we write?
Deals Deeper: Stripe Secondary Deals to Watch: It’s clear that there have been a number of buyers looking to acquire a stake in the company in recent months.
Arc wants to make venture debt popular again: Arc is giving startups a new market to challenge the $30 billion venture debt industry.
GenAI could render KYC useless: There is currently no evidence that GenAI tools have been used to defraud true know-your-customer systems. But some relatively convincing deepfake ID images are cause for caution.
scoop: Treasure Financial’s layoffs come just months after reporting “explosive growth”: layoffs affecting about 60% to 70% of the company’s employees.
Other high profile headlines
Fintech-focused Vetamer Capital closes hedge fund
Analyzing Amazon’s financial services strategy: The retail giant puts focus on fintech
Fintech funding cut in half last year, but VCs are excited about these areas and deals in 2024
Dispatch raises $8M in seed funding
PitchBook Analyst Report: Vertical Opportunities in Reopened IPO Window
Count is not increasing
Follow me on X @bayareawriter, providing the latest fintech news, coffee-related posts, and more.
