From Rent to Stadiums: Bilt Acquires LAVA for $300M
Hey FinTech Fanatic!
If you've been following me for a while, you know I have a particular interest in where FinTech meets sport. Usually that means a payments company signing a big sponsorship deal. This one goes a step further.
Bilt has acquired LAVA in a deal valued at $300 million.
LAVA powers real-time loyalty, membership and customer experiences for sports and entertainment organisations. It works with 56 professional franchises across the NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL and MLS, including the Detroit Lions and the Denver Nuggets.
Bilt, best known for letting people earn rewards on rent, has more than 7 million members and over 50,000 merchant partners.
But there's more to this deal than buying a sports tech company. Bilt plans to combine its AI agents with LAVA's technology to coordinate personalised benefits and offers across businesses, so the loyalty fans feel for their team could follow them into their neighbourhood.
"The stadium may be where the game happens, but the neighborhood is where fandom lives," says Bilt founder and CEO Ankur Jain. For a company that started with rent, that's a clear move beyond housing.
Now the question is how quickly LAVA's technology actually shows up inside Bilt. Definitely one to watch.
And if FinTech x sport deals are your thing too, check out FinTech in the Arena, where I cover the deals, partnerships, and financial technology shaping the sports industry.
Plenty more happened in FinTech today.
Let’s dive in, and I’ll be back in your inbox tomorrow!
Cheers,
INSIGHTS
💡 Neo & Triple-A: From Friction to Flow: How Stablecoins Could Reshape International B2B Collections. A new report by Neo and Triple-A explores the growing gap between interest in stablecoins and their actual adoption among international SMEs. Based on a survey of 100 senior finance professionals across the UK, France, Germany, Italy and Spain, the research found that 88% believe stablecoins could improve cross-border B2B collections, but only 27% currently accept them for customer payments. The report examines the challenges of international collections, stablecoins’ potential role in treasury operations, and the barriers to wider adoption, including the appeal of automatic stablecoin-to-fiat conversion. Explore all the details in the full report here
FINTECH NEWS
🇪🇺 Mastercard launches free cybersecurity learning platform for European SMEs. Initially available in Ireland, Italy, Poland and the UK, Mastercard SME Academy: Cybersecurity will roll out across Europe in 2027. Mastercard's research found 64% of SMEs prioritise cyber protection, but only 37% use security tools.
🇺🇸 Abrigo takes its Sageworks platform offline after suspected cyberattack. The US FinTech disabled the platform on 30 October after detecting irregular activity. Most functions are back, except borrower-facing features, and it remains unclear whether a breach caused the outage.
🇰🇷 Kakao Pay's Q3 operating profit rises 105% YoY to ₩32.5B. Revenue grew 27% to ₩302.1B and net profit rose 72% to ₩32.9B. Payment transaction volume increased 25%, while Kakao Pay Securities' operating profit fell 60.4% QoQ.
🇸🇬 Capital. com secures MAS licence, its first in Southeast Asia. The Capital Markets Services licence allows its Singapore entity to deal in securities and OTC derivatives. Client onboarding is scheduled for early 2027, with former IG Asia CEO Tony Lim leading the business.
🇵🇰 AdalFi plans IPO on the Pakistan Stock Exchange. The Techlogix-owned digital lending platform aims to raise PKR652M ($2.35M) by issuing new shares in November. Proceeds will fund Islamic and small-business lending, technology and marketing.
PAYMENTS NEWS
🇭🇰 DCS DeCard launches corporate cards in Hong Kong as a Mastercard issuer. The Singapore-based platform's DeCard Business Account lets mid-market and enterprise firms issue US dollar-denominated corporate cards and manage spending, invoices and statements in one place. More markets will follow.
🇬🇧 Stripe launches Treasury in the UK, simplifying financial stacks for startups. UK businesses can receive, hold, convert, and spend funds from the Stripe Dashboard. Treasury also offers 1% cashback on eligible card purchases and payouts in 160+ countries.
🇧🇭 Visa to open an office in Bahrain in 2027. The plan was announced at the Gateway Gulf Investment Forum in Manama, with location, staffing and investment details yet to be disclosed. Visa launched its Agentic Ready programme in Bahrain in May.
💳 IXOPAY unveils IXO One, an AI-native modular payments platform. The platform brings together payment orchestration, intelligence and tokenisation, including an agentic suite with a Payment Agent, Universal Tokens and an MCP Server. General availability of the first unified experience is scheduled for early 2027.
🇳🇬 Grey secures CBN approval to operate as an international money transfer operator. The Y Combinator-backed company is now approved to handle inbound transfers into Nigeria, covering person-to-person, business-to-person and business-to-business payments. Grey is already registered with FinCEN in the US and FINTRAC in Canada.
DIGITAL BANKING NEWS
🇵🇾 Paraguay's central bank seizes digital lender Ueno Bank. Regulators put the bank, which has about 3 million customers, into resolution after its solvency ratio fell below half the legal minimum. Customers were locked out of their accounts on the app.
🇳🇿 Revolut becomes New Zealand's first digital bank. Following Reserve Bank of New Zealand approval, Revolut Bank New Zealand launches with a NZ$120M five-year local investment commitment and instant access savings accounts covered by the Depositor Compensation Scheme, marking Revolut's seventh banking licence.
🇿🇦 GoTyme targets South Africa's top retail banking spot by 2036. The digital bank, which has about 13 million customers, aims to reach 30 million and overtake Capitec. CEO Cheslyn Jacobs said a stock market listing is being prepared, with timing dependent on market conditions.
🇰🇬 Kyrgyzstan's Eldik Bank plans yuan bond and London IPO. The state-owned lender may raise up to $500M through a Hong Kong offshore yuan bond this year, months after its debut $500M Eurobond. Its chairman said talks with anchor investors are under way
#FINTECHREPORT
💡 SoFi Q3 2026: Revenue Hits $1.39 Billion, Up 44%. SoFi delivered another record quarter, with net income rising 73% to $241 million and membership growing 35% to 17.1 million. Lending remained the main growth engine, with revenue up 66% to $821.3 million. But the standout is customer engagement: the average member now uses 1.56 products, up from 1.47 a year earlier, while existing members generated 51% of new product openings. Despite a 24% decline in Technology Platform revenue, SoFi raised its guidance and is forecasting approximately $6.4 billion in revenue for 2027. Read the full analysis here
BLOCKCHAIN/CRYPTO NEWS
🌐 Binance says $6.3B hack began with a fake job interview. Attackers compromised an engineer's computer through a fake recruitment process and a tampered AI tool, then gained control of a hot wallet, according to the exchange. About $2.85B has been frozen.
🌐 Binance co-CEO says the exchange can cover its record hack. Speaking at Hong Kong FinTech Week, Richard Teng said Binance is in very strong financial health and has replenished 95% of the stolen tokens. Net customer withdrawals reached $4.72B.
🇰🇵 North Korea denies role in the $6.3B Binance hack. In a statement carried by KCNA, Pyongyang called US allegations absurd rhetoric, and Kim Yo Jong described them as a grave political provocation. The FBI has attributed the attack to North Korea's TraderTraitor unit.
🇧🇷 Mercado Bitcoin pledges to cover all user losses after hack. The Brazilian exchange puts its losses at about $38M after attackers drained hot wallets across 10 blockchains. Tether, Circle and Chainalysis helped freeze $11M, and platform access remains temporarily suspended.
🇭🇰 Crypto. com to shut its Hong Kong consumer app in February. The app will be discontinued on 1 February 2027. Crypto. com will keep pursuing a trading platform licence for its institutional exchange, which currently holds deemed-to-be-licensed status with the SFC.
🇭🇰 Ant International completes live tokenised deposit transfers under HKMA's EnsembleTX. The Hong Kong dollar interbank transfers with Bank of China (Hong Kong), CCB (Asia) and HSBC ran in September and October and settled in HKMA central bank money. Each completed within five minutes.
STABLECOINS NEWS
🇺🇸 OKX launches Mastercard-powered stablecoin card in the US. Available to eligible customers in most states, the WebBank-issued card lets users make purchases backed by USDC, USDT and USDG held in OKX Pay, with up to 10% cashback on eligible USDG purchases.
🇨🇭 Safirum launches Swiss franc stablecoin CHF-S on Solana. The token is backed 1:1 by reserves at Berner Kantonalbank or Banque Richelieu. Users must pass KYC or KYB checks, and transfers cost 0.05% per transaction, capped at 0.50 CHF-S.
PARTNERSHIPS
🇪🇺 Klarna expands Mollie partnership with dispute management and consumer FX. The features will roll out across all Mollie integrations in EEA markets. New Mollie merchants, part of a base of more than 350,000, can also offer Pay in Full, Pay in 3 and financing.
🇫🇮 Klarna partners with DNA on interest-free device payments in Finland. DNA customers can now spread payments for smartphones, tablets and other devices over up to three years. Under the DNA Koroton concept, DNA covers interest and fees while Klarna handles credit.
🌍 Mastercard renews B2B travel payments agreement with INFINIOS. The multi-year deal will scale the Mastercard Wholesale Program, a virtual card product for payments between travel buyers and suppliers, across MENA markets. The Bahrain-based FinTech first introduced it in 2023.
🇯🇴 Mastercard, uwallet and Jordan Post launch BareedPay co-branded card programme. Cardholders can shop online, pay government dues and bills, and send peer-to-peer and cross-border transfers. The programme builds on Jordan Post's 400-plus branches, with uwallet as issuing partner.
🇪🇺 S4BT launches mobile hotel payments wallet with Trevium and Pliant. Travellers receive a browser-based pre-arrival payment link a day before check-in, with no app download required. The wallet is available globally to S4BT clients using Pliant-issued virtual cards.
🇦🇪 Wio Bank partners with Snack Troops on children’s money skills. The UAE digital bank has signed a year-long partnership with Snack Troops, which runs annual school challenges where primary and early secondary students set up hands-on snack ventures.
🇹🇭 Thai virtual bank CLICX selects Thought Machine for core banking. The Krungthai Bank, AIS and OR joint venture will run on Thought Machine's Vault Core. CLICX, Thailand's first licensed virtual bank, plans lending to freelancers, gig workers and small business owners.
🇲🇽 Klar and tapi bring bill payments and top-ups to the Klar app. More than 7 million Klar users in Mexico can now pay electricity, water, internet and phone bills through tapi's payments network. Scheduled and automatic payments are planned next.
🇺🇸 American Express expands NBA and WNBA partnership globally. The multi-year deal adds international activations from the 2026-27 season, including NBA Global Games in Mexico City, Paris and Manchester, and a new partnership with USA Basketball.
🇬🇧 Trust Payments launches virtual cards for travel businesses with Weavr. The single-use Visa cards in GBP and EUR are each linked to a booking and available to eligible UK and EEA travel firms. Trust Payments pays rebates that vary by card and supplier type.
🇬🇧 Zilch partners with Spotify on a Premium offer for Zilch Plus members. Members can get up to four months of Spotify Premium at no extra cost, while eligible returning users receive discounts of up to 75% for two months. The offer went live on 3 November.
🇬🇧 Penfold brings workplace pensions into Deel's payroll and HR platform. UK employers can now set up and manage a Penfold pension directly inside Deel, where employees can track balances and contributions. Penfold's assets under administration have passed £1.5B, up over 72% YoY.
🇫🇷 Kraken lists SG-FORGE's EUR CoinVertible stablecoin. Societe Generale will act as one of the liquidity providers on Kraken for the euro stablecoin. Its use as the cash leg for collateral management in crypto derivatives is planned at a later stage.
🇺🇸 MEMBERS1st Community Credit Union selects Mahalo Banking for digital banking. The credit union will move to Mahalo's Thoughtful Banking platform to upgrade its digital services and expand business banking, as it prepares to switch its core to Corelation KeyStone.
🇱🇾 Wahda Bank partners with Backbase to build a new digital banking platform. Business banking will go live first in 2027 with online onboarding, payroll and invoice management, followed by retail services for more than half a million customers on the Backbase Banking OS.
🇨🇭 AMINA Bank joins RTGS. global's cross-border payments network. The Swiss bank is the first on the network to offer both fiat and digital asset services. Clients can access CHF and EUR accounts and digital wallets at launch, with USD and GBP to follow.
🇬🇧 10x Banking and ezbob partner on SME lending for banks. The partnership starts in the UK as the first step towards a global collaboration, combining 10x's core banking platform with ezbob's automated SME lending technology. No bank launch partner has been named.
🇺🇸 Travis Credit Union launches AI-driven personalised website with Finalytics. ai. The member-owned institution, with 280,000 members, has deployed Finalytics. ai's behavioural intelligence platform across its website. Success will be measured by new accounts opened and total loans funded.
DONEDEAL FUNDING NEWS
🇬🇧 Hoxton Wealth secures $135M commitment from Aspirity Partners. The strategic minority investment is the first outside capital in the London and Dubai-based wealth manager since 2018. It will fund international expansion, adviser hires and targeted acquisitions.
🇮🇳 PowerUp Money raises $10M in round led by Flourish Ventures. Existing investors including Peak XV Partners, Accel and Blume Ventures joined the round. The Bengaluru wealthtech will use the funds to build its AI wealth management platform and expand its managed advisory service.
🇮🇹 Young Group raises €22.5M in round led by Azimut. Luigi Berlusconi took a 0.12% stake in the Turin-based FinTech through his Ithaca 2 vehicle. Young Group plans a single platform combining crypto investing, payments, digital accounts and tokenisation.
🇩🇪 Conlio raises €6.4M to expand AI financial automation for freight across Europe. Piton Capital led the round for the German platform, with Haufe Group Ventures and the venture arms of WALTER GROUP and FIEGE participating. It provides financial operations for road freight forwarders.
🇵🇹 Granter raises €1.6M to take its AI EU-funding platform across Europe. 3XP Global led the round via its Impact Innovation Fund, with Celtis Venture Partners, Gateway Ventures and Deel participating. The Portuguese startup plans to expand into Spain, Germany and Italy.
🇧🇷 Bloquo raises more than R$20M seed round for stablecoin infrastructure. Crescera Capital and Triaxis Capital co-led the Brazilian FinTech's first institutional venture round, with Lattice Capital participating. Bloquo has 125 active institutional clients and has applied to the central bank as a virtual asset broker.
M&A
🇺🇸 Bilt announces $300M acquisition of sports loyalty platform LAVA. LAVA works with 56 professional sports franchises across the NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL and MLS. Bilt has more than 7 million members and over 50,000 merchant partners.
🇪🇺 Fourthline and Veridas complete merger to create a digital identity group. Fourthline CEO Paul Stoddart will lead the Amsterdam-headquartered company, with Veridas CEO Eduardo Azanza as President. The combined business projects 2026 revenue of more than €50M and targets €85M ARR by 2029.
🇷🇴 Raiffeisen Bank completes acquisition of Garanti BBVA Romania. The Romanian unit of RBI bought 100% of the group, including Garanti Bank and its leasing businesses, from BBVA subsidiaries. The two banks will merge but operate separately until then.
AI DEVELOPMENTS
🇭🇰 Sunrate launches agentic card for AI-driven business payments. Authorised AI agents can create virtual cards and execute payments within limits set by businesses, covering merchant category, amount, currency and geography. The card has completed Mastercard Agent Pay certification.
MOVERS AND SHAKERS
🌍 NALA appoints Ashraf Aly as Global Head of Compliance and Risk. Aly joins from TerraPay, where he was Group Head of Compliance, and previously held compliance roles at Careem and iwoca. He will cover NALA's consumer and B2B operations.
🇺🇸 Convera appoints Craig McDonald as SVP, Global Partnerships and Channels. The former Trulioo Chief Revenue Officer will lead partner- and channel-led growth, reporting to Chief Commercial Officer Meaghan Riley. At Trustly, he built the North American business to close to $200M in revenue.
🇺🇸 Momnt names Timothy Bado Chief Compliance Officer. Bado, who joined the home improvement lending platform in 2025 as Senior Legal Counsel, will keep that role while leading compliance. He previously practised law at King & Spalding and Troutman Pepper Locke.
🇪🇸 Former Revolut product chief Dmitry Zlokazov joins Murphy as co-founder and CPO. He will expand Murphy's AI voice agents beyond debt collection into broader credit servicing. Previously Global Head of Product and Head of Retail at Revolut, Zlokazov joins a company serving 34 banks and lenders across 15 countries.
🌐 Zepz appoints Steven Eisenhauer as Chief Risk and Compliance Officer. He will lead global risk, compliance, and financial crime technology investment, and was previously Group Chief Risk and Compliance Officer at EML Payments.
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