MNT-Halan’s $82M Debt Raise: Scaling Egypt’s Credit Machine
Hey FinTech Fanatic!
One of the biggest FinTech stories today is MNT-Halan raising more than $82 million through securitised debt issuances as its active loan portfolio approaches $1 billion.
The numbers give you a sense of the scale: MNT-Halan had EGP 46.7 billion ($947 million) in active loans at the end of June, with around 1.9 million active borrowers and 1,200 distribution points across Egypt. Mounir Nakhla, co-founder and CEO of MNT-Halan, has been leading the company through this expansion.
The company now holds 24.3% of Egypt’s non-bank microfinance market by loan book value and 14% of non-bank consumer finance disbursements.
What I find interesting here is how the funding model is evolving. Instead of relying only on traditional bank credit, MNT-Halan is using securitisation to keep funding its lending business while expanding its presence across microfinance, consumer finance and SMEs.
And there’s another milestone ahead: the company is preparing for a potential Egyptian Exchange IPO, with plans to list up to 20% of its shares.
But as digital finance scales, the challenges around reporting and fraud scale with it. Taxbit looks at why reporting may become the next major challenge in the digital money race, while Incognia explores how increasingly organised fraud networks are connecting people, devices and accounts across borders.
Anyway, plenty more happened in FinTech today.
Let’s dive in, and I’ll be back in your inbox tomorrow!
Cheers,
INSIGHTS
💡 Taxbit: The Next Challenge in the Digital Money Race: Reporting. While the US, China, and Europe are taking different approaches to stablecoins, CBDCs, and digital money, Taxbit argues that the next major challenge is how to identify, classify, and report transactions across assets and jurisdictions. With CARF and CRS 2.0 expanding reporting requirements and the first exchanges beginning in 2027, the focus is shifting from which form of digital money wins to how platforms can handle the reporting complexity at scale. Read the full analysis here
FINTECH NEWS
🇵🇭 Mynt sets GCash IPO price at P6.60 per share, covering a public offering of over 8 billion common shares. At that price the base offer is valued at roughly P52.98 billion, potentially reaching P60.93 billion if the overallotment option is fully exercised. The listing on the PSE Main Board remains subject to SEC and PSE conditions.
🇦🇺 Australia's WeMoney launches an AI and open banking powered lending assessment service. The service combines AI and open banking data to assess lending. The launch applies to lending assessment in Australia.
HOW FINTECH PERFORMED LAST WEEK
📈 A snapshot of last week’s stock moves across public FinTechs:
PAYMENTS NEWS
🇧🇪 Mastercard launches Click to Pay in Belgium, eliminating manual card entry for online purchases. Enrolled cardholders can now pay at participating merchants across devices, as 83% of Belgian consumers cite payment speed as a key factor when shopping online. Belgian e-commerce spending reached €18.3 billion in 2025, up 5.4% YoY.
🇰🇷 Mastercard launches payments security campaign in South Korea, using a K-microdrama format to highlight common risks around online payments and card security. The campaign uses short-form drama to highlight common payment-security risks and promote safer online payment habits.
🇯🇵 Stripe sets 2027 launch for business lending in Japan, announcing Stripe Capital at Stripe Tour Tokyo. Over 150,000 businesses in Japan now use Stripe, with 45,000 joining in the past year. A randomised study found firms accepting Capital offers grew revenue 27 percentage points faster than similar firms that did not.
🇬🇧 Brite Payments launches Pay by Bank in the UK, after securing an EMI licence from the FCA. A survey of 2,000 UK adults found 47% of shoppers suffer checkout rage online. 23% have abandoned a purchase to avoid finding their physical card.
DIGITAL BANKING NEWS
🇭🇺 Revolut users in Hungary face new restrictions, as currency exchanges could be suspended. From 3 December 2026, Revolut may pause exchanges during extreme rate moves or system failures. Some transfers needing currency conversion could also fail.
ARTICLE OF THE DAY
💡 Incognia: What if fraud isn’t hiding in the shadows anymore? What if it’s sitting right in front of us, looking perfectly legitimate? As scam cities industrialise financial crime, fraud networks are bringing together people, devices and accounts across borders - making individual transactions much harder to spot as part of something bigger. Incognia digs into how this underground economy works, and why connecting those dots can change the way we see fraud. Take a closer look at the fraud hiding in plain sight.
BLOCKCHAIN/CRYPTO NEWS
🇺🇸 SEC proposes a new crypto custody framework that would let registered investment advisers self-custody certain crypto assets when no suitable outside custodian is available. The proposal amends rules under the Investment Advisers Act and the Investment Company Act, and opens a pathway for state-chartered trust companies to serve as crypto custodians. Chairman Paul Atkins called existing rules "crafted for a bygone era."
🇪🇺 ECB outlines three models for bringing central bank money on-chain, covering direct issuance of tokenized reserves, bridging existing payment systems with DLT platforms, and tokenizing reserves through private intermediaries. The approaches could enable DLT-based transactions in tokenized securities, deposits, and stablecoins to be settled in central bank money. Each model assigns a different role to the central bank and private sector.
🇺🇸 Block launches its first ever Bitcoin consumer advertising campaign, titled "Bitcoin Does," targeting 60 million bitcoin-curious Americans. The ads show real-world uses of bitcoin through Cash App, Square, and Bitkey, running across YouTube, X, Meta, Fox Sports, and select screenings of Avengers: Doomsday and Dune 3. The campaign runs through December 31, 2026.
🇹🇷 Bybit eyes payments, stocks, and crypto in Türkiye, with CEO Ben Zhou outlining plans to turn the local operation into a financial "super app." Zhou called Türkiye one of the world's top five crypto markets for global exchanges and wants to add international transfers, stablecoin payments, and investment products beyond crypto trading. Some services would require licenses beyond standard crypto permissions.
STABLECOINS NEWS
🌏 Visa reports nearly 200% annual growth in stablecoin card payments, now supporting over 160 stablecoin-linked card programmes globally. Business and commercial cards account for roughly 17% of volume, while research cited by Visa estimates annual stablecoin payment volume at between $401 billion and $527 billion. Payments are now the fastest-growing stablecoin use case.
🇯🇵 SBI wants stablecoin QR payments for Japan-Korea travel, partnering with NICE Information & Telecommunication and DSRV to test cross-border checkout flows. Japanese travelers would pay at NICE-affiliated merchants in South Korea by scanning QR codes, with the joint verification expected to finish by December 2026. NICE brings a Korean merchant network spanning roughly 1.2 million merchants.
🇪🇺 Circle responds to the European Commission's MiCA review consultation, drawing on two years as the largest MiCA-authorised EMT issuer. Circle argues that multi-issuance, where a global stablecoin is co-issued by a MiCA-authorised EU entity alongside a foreign counterpart, is currently the only way to bring global stablecoin liquidity inside MiCA's regulatory perimeter. Only three of the top 25 stablecoins by market cap are MiCA-regulated today.
PARTNERSHIPS
🌎 BMO and Mastercard enable embedded commercial payments within enterprise software, across North America. The collaboration embeds commercial payments directly within enterprise software for business users in the region.
🇺🇸 American Express partners with Perplexity to bring AI tools to business cardholders, letting eligible Amex Business Card Members connect their cards through Plaid and access pre-built workflows for cash-flow forecasting, tax prep, reconciliation, and other business tasks.
🌎 Nubank bets on AI to scale global compliance, rolling out Cardamon's platform across all its markets. Cardamon says it maps regulatory positions up to 20 times faster than legacy systems. Nubank serves more than 140m customers globally.
🇪🇬 EBank deploys IBM watsonx for data governance, with implementation by IBM partner MegaSoft. The deployment ran on premises and took three to four months. Automated rules replaced manual checks and flagged unmasked sensitive data.
DONEDEAL FUNDING NEWS
🇪🇬 MNT-Halan closes $82M in securitised bond issuances as its active loan portfolio approaches $1 billion. The Cairo-based unicorn held a 24.3% share of Egypt's non-bank microfinance market and 14% of consumer finance disbursements by end of 2025. All three tranches carry a 13-month maturity and an A- credit rating from MERIS.
🇸🇪 Trustly receives equity commitments of more than USD 40m, from Nordic Capital and Alfven and Didrikson. The capital will accelerate its growth strategy powered by AI. Trustly Group AB is supervised by Sweden's Finansinspektionen.
🇺🇸 Robinhood Ventures Fund II invests over $15M in 46 companies from Y Combinator's Summer 2026 batch, with individual checks ranging from $100,000 to $600,000. The fund was built to meet founders at the earliest stages, according to Head of Robinhood Ventures Sarah Pinto. Retail investors gain exposure to the batch through the publicly listed RVII vehicle.
🇺🇸 Settle secures a $240m credit facility, to scale lending to larger customers. The funding comes from a major international institution and a New York asset manager. Settle has now originated more than $4bn in total. Read more
🇨🇴 Colombian FinTech Platam adds B Venture Capital as an investor, to expand working capital access for MSMEs. Platam more than tripled its portfolio over the last six months. It offers embedded lending through BNPL, confirming and factoring.
🌎 Argentine FinTech Uin raises US$2 million in funding, to expand recurrence technology across LatAm. The new funding will support product development and team expansion as the company grows across the region.
M&A
🇬🇧 Monzo explores private equity options, after Nubank deal falls through. Monzo held early talks with CVC and Advent International about selling up to 15%. Nubank talks ended over Monzo's valuation of up to £10 billion.
🇺🇸 Bloomberg completes its Canoe Intelligence acquisition, advancing its strategy to transform private markets investing. The completed deal brings Canoe Intelligence into Bloomberg's private markets strategy.
🇮🇱 Nayax completes its acquisition of IPS Group, expanding its unattended payments footprint into smart parking and urban mobility. The deal adds IPS Group's parking meter and sensor technology to Nayax's global payment platform, which serves vending, EV charging, and other self-service verticals across over 80 countries. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
🇺🇸 Sovos acquires Flowie, launching an agentic compliant finance orchestration platform. Flowie's AI agents run accounts payable, invoicing and collections end to end. The agents will draw on Sovos tax compliance and regulatory data.
🇨🇴 Grupo Cibest plans to acquire 100% of FinTech PTM, through Estrategias Cibest. PTM manages banking agent networks linking about 20,000 merchants across Colombia. It offers traditional correspondent services with Bancolombia and digital services with Nequi, Grupo Aval, Davivienda, DaviPlata, BBVA, and Banco Agrario. Keep reading
🇺🇸 Trading Technologies acquires TRAFiX, to expand into global equities and equity options. TRAFiX's OEMS capabilities will integrate into TT's cloud platform. TRAFiX serves more than 200 customers and connects to more than 100 trading venues.
🇪🇺 The Payments Association acquires TPA EU, following a unanimous vote by TPA EU members. The deal creates a network of more than 350 member organisations. TPA EU stays based in Luxembourg, led by general manager Thibault de Barsy.
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