Latvian fintech VIA SMS Group continues to expand its presence in Asia-Pacific by investing in the development of consumer lending brand VAMO.ph in the Philippines. The decision on further strategic expansion in the region follows successful business operations in Vietnam launched in 2019 in partnership with another well-known consumer lender TWINO. Since the company’s launch in 2019, Vietnamese VAMO.vn has issued loans with a total value of more than 3 million EUR. VAMO.ph launched its operations in Philippines in the beginning of this year, and currently the company is engaged in intensive technical development to prepare for the product public…

HIPS Payment Group, an Ireland-based provider of e-commerce and mobile payment solutions, and The Payment House, a Nordic payment processor for taxi companies in Scandinavia, announced their partnership to enable payment with crypto currency in over 20,000 taxis in Scandinavia and 10,000 taxis in the UK. The two companies will leverage each other’s technologies so that consumers can easily use crypto payments at real-time transaction speeds, offering a convenient payment method not currently in use. The solution, which is planned to roll out in beta November 2021, will use the Hips Merchant Protocol (HMP) and Hips Merchant Gateway (HMP-gateway) over…

Norges Bank, the central bank of Norway, announced that it will test various technical solutions for a central bank digital currency (CBDC) over the next two years in line with the recommendations of an internal working group. The working group is of the opinion that the motivation for research into CBDCs has been strengthened. Many central banks are in the process of carrying out similar research, and several are already under way with technical testing. At the same time, payment technologies have evolved at a rapid pace, and cash usage has fallen further. The share of cash payments in Norway…

U.S.-based fintech Stripe announced that it has launched its issuing services across 20 European countries. Stripe Issuing is now available in Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, and the UK. The issuing service enables users to create, manage, and distribute virtual and physical payment cards, giving businesses more control over how they spend their money. Cards created on Stripe Issuing can be programmatically controlled, with dynamic spending limits, blocked merchant categories, advanced combinations of rules, and real-time authorisations for each transaction, managed via Stripe’s Issuing API.…

Latvian bank Citadele and retail store Maxima has signed an agreement on card acquiring for almost all 1300 POS terminals in all 176 Maxima shops in Latvia in order to serve customers with lower risk of payment interruption. The partnership with Citadele will secure multi-bank POS set-up in Maxima, which splits card payment traffic between several banks and ensures higher service availability for its customers. This is in case there are technical challenges in one bank, the system will provide an opportunity to switch all payments immediately to another service provider. “Citadele is building a long-term partnership with retailers across…

Norway is home to over 120 fintech companies with the vast majority of solutions available right now focusing on mobile payments and online banking, though other segments such as data and analytics, insurtech, data and analytics, and wealthtech, are also represented, data from TheFactor, a fintech and proptech incubator and accelerator, show. Several Norwegian fintechs have grown to notable size, attracting the interest of foreign investors and expanding overseas. To get a sense of Norway’s biggest, most successful fintech companies, we’ve compiled a list of six Norwegian fintechs that have recorded strong growth, made notable strides this past year, and…

Finland is home to more than 200 fintech companies, which have raised a combined EUR 450 million in funding, and generated EUR 1.3 billion in revenue in 2019, data from industry trade group Fintech Farm Helsinki show. These fintechs have grown tremendously over the past years, with several of them expanding overseas and reaching global recognition. To get a sense of Finland’s biggest, most successful fintech companies, we’ve compiled a list of nine Finnish fintechs that have demonstrated strong growth and which deserve to be followed very closely. For this list, we’ve selected independent, private Finnish fintech companies and excluded…

Returpack, a Swedish privately owned company that aims to increase recycling, has selected fintech startup Payer to develop a new IoT technology with the aim to create an easy digital payout experience for consumers. Payer was chosen to develop the core engine, a machine-to-consumer, digital payout solution directly to the consumers’ bank account that was built using Payer’s modular API payments platform. The digital solution is now being rolled out across Sweden. In the first roll-out phase are 57 machines, designed to receive bulk deposits. The solution works in a combination of the machine, the cloud and a mobile app.…

Lithuania-based Bankera, a fintech focused on serving blockchain businesses, recently announced support of the SEPA Instant payments. With this move, both personal and business clients have access to instant transfers within more than 2,300 banks and financial institutions among the Single European Payment Area (SEPA) network at any time including holidays. The option allows to process deposits and withdrawals within SEPA instantly; businesses offering this possibility are much more attractive to end-users, as it significantly decreases the time required to process payments. Besides, it opens up a way for companies to settle with suppliers or business partners in seconds. “Our…

ArcaPay UAB, the subsidiary of ArcaPay, a UK-based and FCA regulated cross-border payments platform, has been granted a payment institution license by the Bank of Lithuania. The company, founded in London in 2011, is opening a new base in Lithuania and announced post-Brexit expansion plans. By establishing a base in an emerging fintech center in Vilnius, Lithuania, ArcaPay expects to penetrate Lithuanian, Latvian, Polish and Scandinavian markets. The new entity will be headed by Virginijus Kausas, who has played a key role in ArcaPay’s expansion in the EU in recent years. ArcaPay specialises in cross-border payments, foreign exchange and currency…

Veriff, an Estonian identity verification provider, announced that it has secured US$ 69 million in Series B financing in a round led by investment firms IVP and Accel. This latest investment brings Veriff’s total secured funding to date to US$ 92.8 million. Jules Maltz of IVP and Matt Weigand of Accel will also join Veriff’s board of directors as a result of the investment. With this latest round of funding, Veriff said that it will continue building on its fast-growing market opportunity in the U.S. and deliver on its promise of building a stronger source of identity online than government-issued…

Finland-based mobile payments platform ePassi has launched a unique collaboration with Finnair where members of their frequent flyer program can now pay for services with Finnair Plus points at the former’s merchant sites around Finland. ePassi, operating in Finland and Sweden, currently has 1.5 million users and 35,000 merchant sites in the Nordic countries. Payments can be made using the ePassi mobile app at the checkout of the chosen site. The collaboration will be further expanded to include thousands of restaurants towards the summer of 2021. ePassi and Finnair expect the service to gain popularity among a vast group of…

Latvian airline airBaltic announces that it will become the world’s first airline to issue non-fungible tokens (NFTs). The airline will issue limited collector NFTs showcasing an individual Airbus A220-300 with its registration as well as a piece of art of one of the most beloved Latvian cities to promote tourism and Latvia in the world. Martin Gauss, Chief Executive Officer of airBaltic: “The blockchain technology has proven to be here long-term. After being the first airline to accept Bitcoin as a form of payment, it is the next step for us in blockchain technology to offer non-fungible tokens. NFTs are…

Meniga, a provider of digital banking solutions founded in Iceland, announced that it has closed a €10 million strategic investment round. The round was led by institutional investors, Velocity Capital Fintech Ventures, and Frumtak Ventures. Other participants in the round include Industrifonden, the UK Government’s Future Fund, and existing customers UniCredit, Swedbank, Groupe BPCE, and Íslandsbanki. Meniga said that the funding will be used for continued investment in Meniga’s R&D activities, and in particular the development of innovative green banking products. Additionally, the new injection of investment will help strengthen Meniga’s sales and service teams. In 2020, Meniga said that…

Jeff App, a Latvian fintech startup providing a data-enabled loan brokerage platform for unbanked customers in Asia, has closed a $1 million financing round. Jeff App said that the funds will be used to launch new products and fuel growth in Vietnam, their first market, before expanding into other countries in Southeast Asia. The startup will also use the funds to launch and scale new products that range from a free credit score and insurance offers to digital discount coupons and mobile wallet cashbacks. Additionally, the funding will also help to expand across the region, starting with Indonesia and the…

Nordic-based card issuing and payment processing services provider Enfuce has raised €7 million in Series B funding led by Tencent who had invested €5 million in the company. Meanwhile, Enfuce’s prior investors Maki.vc invested the other €2 million, bringing the total amount raised by the company to €15 million so far. With the investment, Enfuce is set to gain more growth in Europe as well as globally, and explore the opportunities of company acquisitions to speed up growth. Enfuce reportedly has a global customer base spanning 16 countries to provide innovative payment, open banking, and sustainability services for corporates and…

Opera Limited, a browser provider headquartered in Oslo, announced that it has hired PayPal veteran Allen Hu as the new Executive Vice President (EVP) of Dify, which is the browser’s fintech arm. An expert in financial technology and payments, Allen Hu will lead the Dify business. He brings a wealth of experience from nearly ten years at PayPal, where he was Regional Head of Global Core Payments, based in California. Hu gained expertise in fintech as a Venture Partner in Sequoia Capital China, where he focused on investments in the fintech sector. Prior to that, he was the General Manager…

Temenos, a Swiss banking software company, announced that Lithuanian electronic money institution FINCI has gone live with Temenos. FINCI said that Temenos’ rich banking functionality and API-first, microservices-based technology enabled it to design, build and launch the service from scratch in just 4 months. FINCI is running next generation Temenos Payments on cloud-native technology along with Temenos Transact core banking on the same environment. This allows FINCI users to send, manage and receive instant multi-currency payments alongside with possibility for further extension of intelligent financial management tools all within a single app. FINCI said that it aims to simplify daily…

Revolut has launched as a bank in 10 additional European markets with a specialised banking license from the European Central Bank via the Bank of Lithuania. Customers in Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Estonia, Greece, Latvia, Malta, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia who upgrade to Revolut Bank for additional services will now have their deposits protected under the deposit guarantee scheme. Customers in aforementioned countries are now able to upgrade to Revolut Bank for additional services from within the app. The upgrade process will reportedly only take customers a mere few minutes. To date,Revolut Group has raised almost $1 billion in investment and…

Estonia is emerging as a leader in e-government, embracing digital platforms and technologies to bring seamless and convenient e-services to citizens. Today, 99% of public services, including tax filings and public voting, are available digitally to Estonians, and these solutions have allowed the country to save over 800 years of working time and 2% of gross domestic product (GDP) annually, according to a new report by consulting firm PwC. In 1997, Estonia began building its digital society through an e-governance system to provide public services online. This was later formalised with the launch of e-Estonia, a policy that has led…