This week’s edition of Finovate Global reviews the latest fintech developments in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE).
This region features a diverse range of countries including Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, the Slovak Republic, and Slovenia. More than 250 million people live in the CEE, which has a combined GDP of $2.6 trillion.
Romania’s Salt goes live with Starling’s SaaS platform
Romania’s Salt Bank launched this month, giving the country its first 100% digital bank. Salt Bank reported that more than 80,000 people signed up in less than three weeks to be a part of the new financial institution.
“By launching Salt, we are not only bringing the first 100% Romanian neobank to the Romanian market, but we are also offering a unique perspective that combines technology and finance,” Salt Bank CEO Gabriela Nistor said.
Salt Bank currently offers 3% yearly interest on current accounts as well as on Spaces, Salt Bank’s savings account offering, as long as customers make payments of 1,000 lei/month or more (equivalent to $215). Customers also get a multi-currency card that enables transactions in 17 currencies around the world. Users of the Salt banking app can take advantage of money management tools, in-app card controls, as well as Apple and Google Pay in-app provisioning.
Headquartered in Bucharest, Salt Bank is owned by the Banca Transilvania Financial Group. The institution also offers its customers the opportunity to become founders of Salt Bank and, ultimately, shareholders in the event that the institution goes public. Salt Bank notes that its Salt Founders Community currently has 2,200 members.
Powering the launch is Starling’s SaaS platform Engine, which helped the digital bank onboard 100,000 customers in the first two weeks of operation. And although AMP Bank in Australia has also announced that it will deploy Engine, the institution is not scheduled to do so until 2025, making Salt Bank the first bank to go live with the technology.
“Our work with Salt Bank shows just what our platform is capable of,” Engine by Starling CEO Sam Everington said, “Starling’s feature rich and highly personalizable banking products can be deployed around the world to attract impressive customer volumes, while our operational experience and cloud-expertise can help build, launch, and run a bank in less than 12 months.”
Latvian fintech inGain raises EUR 650,000
inGain, a no-code SaaS loan management system based in Latvia, has raised $692,000 (EUR 650,000) in funding. Participating in the investment were VC funds Trind VC and Fiedler Capital. The Latvian Business Angels network and other business angels were also involved in the round.
The funding announcement marked the first publicly announced investment in a Latvian startup in 2024. The company will use the capital to complete work on its SaaS-based loan management system that helps facilitate lending for products that banks traditionally have been reluctant to finance. inGain Co-founder and CEO Armands Liseks explained how inGain works, using the example of a family trying to decide whether or not to commit to their child’s efforts to become the next Mozart.
“Some parents are ready to buy a piano, but what happens if they spend several months trying to persuade their kids to play the piano, but their kids still refuse to play it?” Liseks asked. “It is with this kind of situation in mind that the seller would like to offer piano leasing. For parents, this means that the payment for the musical instrument will be higher. However, this also gives them two options: either the piano is eventually purchased in full or can be returned to the seller at any time.”
Liseks added that inGain’s solution even benefits those who know they are ready to buy. “How can the bank offer leasing for the piano?” he said. “Most likely it will advise the customer to use a credit card or take out a consumer loan with 20% interest, which makes no sense whatsoever.”
inGain is headquartered in Riga. The company was founded in 2011.
Bulgaria’s Paynetics acquires UK neobank Novus
Here is some CEE-based acquisition news in the payments space that slipped beneath our radar this spring. Bulgaria’s Paynetics has acquired Novus, a neobank based in the U.K., for an undisclosed sum.
A B-corp certified digital bank – and self-described “impact neobank” – Novus enables customers to monitor their carbon footprint and get cashback when they make sustainable purchases via the app. Additionally, Novus automatically directs a portion of revenue from every transaction to an NGO of the customer’s choice.
For Paynetics, the acquisition will enable the company to offer carbon- and climate-conscious solutions to customers as well as expand “the environmental, social, and governance (ESG) ecosystem across Europe.” Paynetics will also leverage the acquisition to help its clients achieve their social and environmental goals via its own embedded finance solution.
“This deal not only reinforces our dedication to ESG but also marks a significant leap forward in revolutionizing the financial sector with our cutting-edge embedded finance suite,” Paynetics noted in a post on LinkedIn.
Founded in 2005 and headquartered in Sofia, Bulgaria, Paynetics acquisition news comes a year after the firm was granted an electronic money institution (EMI) license from the U.K.’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). Last month, the company announced that it had promoted Hana Rolles from Chief Revenue Officer to U.K. Chief Executive Officer.
Here is our look at fintech innovation around the world.
Latin America and the Caribbean
Asia-Pacific
U.S.-based payments provider Nium officially registered as a Financial Services Provider in New Zealand.
South Korea joined seven-nation, cross-border payments tokenization initiative.
Ant International announced plans to set up a new digital business center in Malaysia.
Sub-Saharan Africa
Pan-African payments provider Onafriq partnered with Mastercard to bring payment options to consumers and SMEs in Africa.
TechCrunch profiled Nigerian fintech LemFi, which provides money transfer services to African migrants.
South African fintech Float secured a $11 million funding facility from Standard Bank.
Central and Eastern Europe
Middle East and Northern Africa
Core banking software provider Tuum announced its expansion to the Middle East and the establishment of a regional headquarters at ADGM.
Israel’s central bank reported that it will launch a sandbox to enable private sector entities to experiment with central bank digital currencies (CBDCs).
UAE-based digital fintech infrastructure firm Fils teamed up with digital banking solutions company Aion to advanced ESG in the MENA region.
Central and Southern Asia
Amazon Pay introduced credit services to the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) platform in partnership with the National Payments Corporation of India.
Separate from Google Pay, Google Wallet readied to go live in India.
Indian home financing company Altum Credo raised $40 million in Series C funding.
Photo by Eduard Balan
