Singapore fintech startup Instarem closes $41M Series C for global growth

Singapore’s Instarem, a fintech startup that helps banks and consumers send money overseas at lower cost, has closed a $41 million Series C financing round to go after global expansion opportunities. The four-year-old company announced a first close of $20 million last November, and it has now doubled that tally (and a little extra) thanks […]

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Visa and Mastercard could raise interchange fees

According to a report from the WSJ, Visa and Mastercard are considering raising interchange fees on card transactions in the U.S. Visa and Mastercard generate most of their revenue from these small processing fees, and it could have implications for merchants and fintech startups. When you pay with a credit or debit card, merchants pay […]

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Africa Roundup: Zimbabwe’s net blackout, Partech’s $143M fund, Andela’s $100M raise, Flutterwave’s pivot

Jake Bright Contributor Jake Bright is a writer and author in New York City. He is co-author of The Next Africa. More posts by this contributor Partech is doubling the size of its African venture fund to $143 million Zimbabwe’s government faces off against its tech community over internet restrictions A high court in Zimbabwe […]

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Chat app Line’s mobile payment service is getting its own Visa card

Brown, Cony and the gang are coming to a credit card near you in Japan. Line, the messaging app company behind the cute sticker characters, announced today that it is bringing its payment service to plastic through a tie-in with Visa. Line is Japan’s largest chat app with an estimated 50 million registered users. The cards […]

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Flutterwave and Visa launch African consumer payment service GetBarter

Jake Bright Contributor Jake Bright is a writer and author in New York City. He is co-author of The Next Africa. More posts by this contributor Harley Davidson reveals more about its push into electric vehicles Venture capital, global expansion, blockchain and drones characterize African tech in 2018 Fintech startup Flutterwave has partnered with Visa to launch […]

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2019 looks to continue another lights out year for fintech startups

Dana Stalder Contributor Dana Stalder is a general partner at Matrix Partners and invests in fintech, consumer marketplaces and enterprise software. More posts by this contributor Financial technology startups emerged as serious challengers to financial services in 2017 New rules for hiring executive candidates Allen Miller Contributor Allen Miller is a venture captialist at Matrix […]

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Cross-border fintech startup Instarem raises $20M for global expansion

Instarem, a Singapore-based startup that helps banks transfer money overseas cheaply, has raised a Series C round of over $20 million for global expansion. The round is led by MDI Ventures — the VC arm of Indonesian telecom operator Telkom — and Beacon — the fund belonging to Thai bank Kasikorn — as well as […]

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Woman accidentally informs the U.S. that she’s a terrorist via online travel form

While planning a visit to the United States, a British woman unwittingly answered “Yes” to an online travel application query asking if she had ever engaged in terrorist activity.
Accordingly, Mandie Stevenson’s U.S. travel application was promptly d…

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Japanese fintech startup Paidy lands strategic investment from Visa

A month after announcing its $55 million Series C, Japanese fintech startup Paidy has snagged a strategic investment from payment giant Visa. Paidy didn’t disclose how much Visa put into its business, which has raised over $80 million to date, but it did say that it will work with the credit card giant to develop “new […]

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Microsoft engineer shares her immigration story and sheds light on a broken system

In a heart-wrenching post, a Microsoft software engineer opened up about her personal immigration story.
Sri Ponnada shared on Facebook that she must leave the United States in six months because of the nation’s current immigration issues that have f…

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Brex picks up $57M to build an easy credit card for startups

While Henrique Dubugras and Pedro Franceschi were giving up on their augmented reality startup inside Y Combinator and figuring out what to do next, they saw their batch mates struggling to get even the most basic corporate credit cards — and in a lot of cases, having to guarantee those cards themselves. Brex, their new startup,  aims […]

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