Payments startup Now raises $9.5M in Series A funding

Payments startup Now raises $9.5M in Series A funding

Unbeknownst to many, Georgia-based lawyer Stacey Abrams – yes, that Stacey Abrams – has been a fintech entrepreneur since 2010. Together with Lara O’Connor Hodgson, Abrams co-founded Now, a toolset that automates the process and timing around when businesses get paid.

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Payments startup Now raises $9.5M in Series A funding

Payments startup Now raises $9.5M in Series A funding

Unbeknownst to many, Georgia-based lawyer Stacey Abrams – yes, that Stacey Abrams – has been a fintech entrepreneur since 2010.

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Credit Sesame acquires fintech software company Zingo as it expands capabilities

Credit Sesame acquires fintech software company Zingo as it expands capabilities

Credit Sesame, a credit monitoring and personal finance management platform, announced that it acquired Zingo, a software firm whose toolset allows its customers to boost their credit scores by adding rent payments.

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Walmart taps PayNearMe to enable in-store bill payments

Walmart taps PayNearMe to enable in-store bill payments

Two months after filing a patent for fintech offering Hazel by Walmart – an amalgam of products and services that look a lot like a robo-adviser – the retail giant announced a partnership with bill payment fintech PayNearMe and Green Dot Bank in an effort to get customers to pay their bills at its stores.

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Square is considering creating a non-custodial hardware wallet for bitcoin

Square is considering creating a non-custodial hardware wallet for bitcoin

At a bitcoin conference in Miami last week, Square CEO Jack Dorsey said the company was considering creating a non-custodial hardware wallet for bitcoin, a move Dorsey said could help “take it to the next level and get to 100 more million people.”

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Dave to go public via merger with SPAC at $4B valuation

Dave to go public via merger with SPAC at $4B valuation

Dave, a California-based challenger bank, personal finance app and earned-wage access provider, announced plans to merge with VPC Impact Acquisition Holdings III, Inc., a special-purpose acquisition company sponsored by Victory Park Capital.

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Acorns is going public through $2B SPAC deal

Acorns is going public through $2B SPAC deal

Acorns, the California-based personal finance app that launched in 2014, is going public through a merger with Pioneer Merger Corp., a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) affiliated with hedge funds Falcon Edge Capital and Patriot Global Management.

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Square takes on Amazon and other e-commerce rivals by partnering with Google

Square takes on Amazon and other e-commerce rivals by partnering with Google

Square is partnering with Google to offer sellers on its platform greater visibility.

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Sen. Elizabeth Warren puts Chase CEO Jamie Dimon in hot seat on overdraft fees

Sen. Elizabeth Warren puts Chase CEO Jamie Dimon in hot seat on overdraft fees

Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase CEO, along with bank CEOs of the five other largest banks in the U.S., testified before the Senate Banking Committee on Wednesday, May 26. A focus was overdraft fees, which banks continued to charge during the pandemic despite additional flexibility from regulators.

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PayPal and Venmo users will soon be able to send crypto to each other and to external wallets

PayPal and Venmo users will soon be able to send crypto to each other and to external wallets

PayPal’s head of blockchain and crypto, Jose Fernandez da Ponte, announced that Paypal and Venmo users will be able to send bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies to one another and to other apps.

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HSBC says it won’t offer clients bitcoin, citing volatility and a lack of transparency

HSBC says it won’t offer clients bitcoin, citing volatility and a lack of transparency

HSBC, a global bank with nearly $3T in assets, has decided not to offer bitcoin-related products and services to clients, bucking the trend of other large banks and traditional financial companies that are warming to digital assets, including JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo.

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Square to roll out checking and savings accounts for business customers

Square to roll out checking and savings accounts for business customers

Square is quickly expanding its territory beyond payments. The firm, which obtained a bank charter in March, is reportedly on the cusp of offering checking and savings accounts for its small-business customers.

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Merrill Lynch Wealth Management nixes cold calls from adviser training

Merrill Lynch Wealth Management nixes cold calls from adviser training

In an apparent nod to digital-centric customer behaviors, Merrill Lynch Wealth Management is no longer making cold calls a part of its training program for incoming brokers.

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After entering the US, Australian ‘buy now, pay later’ firm Zip is using a similar playbook in Europe and the UAE

After entering the US, Australian ‘buy now, pay later’ firm Zip is using a similar playbook in Europe and the UAE

Zip Co, an Australia-based ‘buy now, pay later’ (BNPL) company, is in a race against rivals Klarna and Afterpay to capture as much global market share as quickly as possible.

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Acting Comptroller of the Currency Michael Hsu signals greater oversight on fintech charters

Acting Comptroller of the Currency Michael Hsu signals greater oversight on fintech charters

In testimony before the House Financial Services Committee this week, acting Comptroller of the Currency Michael Hsu suggested fintech charters may be looked at more closely.

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