Despite the ups and downs of the fintech space, people still really care about it
Reading Time: 3 minutesWelcome back to The Interchange, where we take a look at the hottest fintech news of the previous week. If you want to receive The Interchange directly in your inbox every Sunday, head here to sign up!
Disrupt!
One-on-one chats on the fintech stage included Robinhood co-founder and CEO Vlad Tenev, Plaid founder Zach Perret, Checkout.com president and COO Céline Dufétel. There was also a panel of bankers discussing a post–Silicon Valley Bank world. In reality, though, SVB is still alive and kicking.
Here are the stories that summarized the highlights of those chats and panels:
- As Robinhood eyes global expansion, CEO says: ‘We’ve made a lot of progress’
- Plaid’s Zach Perret on Visa, valuations and privacy
- After cutting ties with Binance, Checkout.com says crypto companies are about 4% of its total processing volume
- SVB’s commercial banking president: ‘Come on back, the water’s fine’
Battlefield 20
MakersHub deciphers accounts payable data so construction companies don’t have to
Battlefield 200
Kenyan fintech FlexPay is helping shoppers save for future purchases
Don’t want that commuter stipend? Bundl enables employees to choose their own company benefits
Making health savings work for you
This week, I wrote about Truemed, a company that wants to put food in front of medicine.
Calley Means and Justin Mares started the payment integration company last year to make it easy for consumers to pay for healthy food, exercise and supplements using their tax-free health savings accounts or flexible spending account dollars. And with regulatory compliance.
Most patients need some kind of letter of medical necessity to use HSA or FSA dollars on items outside of procedures or medication. Tapping into telehealth laws, Truemed collects certain data points and then seamlessly and asynchronously provides that letter without a doctor’s visit.
About $140 billion is sitting in these accounts, mostly going unused, and the IRS increased the amount you can contribute to health savings accounts to $4,150 for an individual and $8,300 for a family. This will hopefully enable people to more easily put these dollars to work.
The company launched this week with $3 billion of gross merchandise volume already amassed from businesses, including CrossFit, Magic Mind and Kos. It also received $3.5 million in SAFEs (simple agreement for future equity) from investors, including functional medicine pioneer Mark Hyman and founders from Thrive Market, Eight Sleep and Levels.
I separately corresponded with Kevin Robertson, executive managing director and chief revenue officer at HSA Bank, a division of Webster Bank, about how HSA and FSA benefits are being used as a retention piece for tech companies.
A trend Robertson is seeing is that employers are increasingly matching pre-tax employee HSA and FSA contributions. There is also interest in doing more of what is called a lifestyle spending account, more popular in Canada currently.
LSAs aren’t pre-tax dollars, though he notes these particular accounts provide a more personalized benefit experience. For example, an employer can designate these accounts be used for pet care, spa treatments and even fitness reimbursement.
‘In today’s tight labor market, more companies are enhancing their core benefit offerings to show themselves as an attractive place to work,’ Robertson said. ‘This is particularly true for technology companies who generally are known for flashy perks like free lunches, casual dress and happy hours.’ Read more. — Christine
Other weekly news
Other items we are reading:
Block’s stock has been a laggard lately. Will management shakeup provide a needed jolt?
Solid faked revenue numbers, special committee appointed to investigate, sources reveal (We covered Solid’s $63 million Series B round back in 2022.)
Nova Credit partners with HSBC for cross border credit sharing
Varo aims to displace Venmo, Cash App volume with new P2P feature
Apple officially launches Tap to Pay in Brazil as international expansion continues
Tipalti lights up expenses solution and Tipalti card
Treasury Prime announces integration with Astra to bring real time payment capabilities to customers
Fundraising and M&A
ZayZoon, which lends employees money for a fee, raises $34.5M
IFC leads $5M extension round in Ivorian SaaS e-commerce platform ANKA
As seen elsewhere
Flex secures $20M equity and $100M debt fundraise to build a one-stop-shop financial hub for SMBs
Allocate closes $10M strategic capital
Dallas healthcare benefits platform take command gets $25M growth investment
Openly secures $100M in Series D funding
Reference: https://techcrunch.com/2023/09/24/fintech-disrupt-edition/
Ref: techcrunch
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