Swedish Startups Take the Spotlight in Mastercard Lighthouse’s Latest Round
Hey FinTech Fanatic!
Swedish Preventum Labs and Manje Health stood out in the latest Mastercard Lighthouse cohort, Mastercard’s startup partnership program that connects early-stage companies with banks, investors, and corporate partners.
Preventum Labs won the FINITIV track for its AI-powered fraud prevention tools, while Manje Health took the MASSIV prize for building compliant cross-border healthcare payment infrastructure. Both startups now gain access to Mastercard’s broader ecosystem, including the chance to pitch for Start Path.
Among the other FinTech winners, SKJOLDET was recognized for its evidence-based fraud signals that help merchants assess risk before a transaction is completed. Tapaya is turning any mobile app into a multi-method in-store payment terminal, while Enty offers a single control panel for back-office operations.
Scroll down to find what else is going on in the FinTech world. 👇 See you on tomorrow!
Cheers,
HOW FINTECH PERFORMED LAST WEEK
📈 A snapshot of last week’s stock moves across public FinTechs:
FINTECH NEWS
🌍 Nordic startups named winners of Mastercard Lighthouse Spring 2026. Mastercard has announced the winners of the leading startup partnership program Mastercard Lighthouse in the Nordics and Baltics, consisting of two parallel classes: FINITIV, for FinTech companies, and MASSIV, for startups in sustainability and social impact tech. Read the winners here
🇨🇦 Wealthsimple expands into family and business banking, including household finance management, kids accounts, business chequing, and spending insights, as it pushes to become a full financial platform for Canadians. The company also launched Spend Insights, giving clients a real-time view of transactions across Wealthsimple credit card and chequing accounts.
🇺🇸 At Plaid Effects 2026, the company unveiled new AI-powered financial intelligence tools, including fraud detection, lending, payments, and cash advance models, alongside developer tools and foundation models trained on network-scale financial data. Continue reading
🇺🇸 Polish FinTech executive Marcin Pioro arrested in Missouri following Poland’s extradition request over alleged fraud and money laundering tied to Cinkciarz.pl and Conotoxia. Polish authorities say over 2,000 customers lost nearly $30M across multiple currencies. They also reported around 7,000 public complaints and interviews with at least 900 witnesses at the time of the extradition request.
PAYMENTS NEWS
🇭🇰 PhotonPay has been recognized on the 2026 Global AI 100 list for its innovative use of AI in global payment infrastructure. The company stood out for advancing transaction automation, optimizing fund management, strengthening compliance processes, and implementing intelligent risk control systems, reinforcing its expansion of AI-powered financial services for businesses operating worldwide.
🌍 Masspay expands global payout infrastructure with support for 35+ local fiat funding currencies. Businesses across every major region can now fund their payout accounts in local currency and disburse worldwide from that same balance, in addition to MassPay's existing support for stablecoin and cryptocurrency.
🇮🇪 What Revolut is saying about Zippay behind closed doors. The FinTech privately raised concerns that Ireland’s new Zippay instant payments platform could give traditional banks a competitive edge, as customers may need accounts with founding banks to access the service.
🇿🇦 PayShap moves beyond peer-to-peer payments. The South African platform is expanding beyond P2P transfers into merchant payments, e-commerce and QR transactions, as banks, FinTechs and retailers push to scale instant payments and drive adoption across underserved communities and businesses.
REGTECH NEWS
🇱🇹 iDenfy launches a new dynamic KYB workflow feature on its Business Verification platform to better optimize conversions. This new functionality enables companies to automatically direct representatives completing onboarding to the most suitable KYB flow based on their responses, helping businesses scale the KYB onboarding process more effectively.
DIGITAL BANKING NEWS
🇱🇺 UK FinTech unicorn Tide has chosen Luxembourg as its European headquarters and applied for a payment institution licence with the CSSF, as the SME banking platform expands across Europe with plans to grow its local team and launch services in France. Continue reading
🇮🇹 N26 has launched Travel eSIM mobile plans in Italy, allowing customers to activate digital roaming data in over 100 countries directly through the app. The new feature expands N26’s travel offering with integrated connectivity, payments, insurance, and travel perks.
🇵🇹 Revolut is opening a new sales hub in Matosinhos as part of its Iberian expansion strategy, with plans to invest €30 million in Portugal and create 250 new jobs by 2028. The office will support international growth of Revolut Business across multiple markets.
🇵🇪 Efectiva Tu financiera receives approval to become Efectibank. Peru’s SBS authorized the institution’s conversion into a bank as part of a strategy to expand operations and strengthen its position in the country’s financial sector under the commercial brand Efectibank.
BLOCKCHAIN/CRYPTO NEWS
🇧🇹 RedotPay sets up local entity in Bhutan’s GMC for stablecoin payments in partnership with Gelephu Mindfulness City. The company stated its decision to establish a physical presence inside GMC reflects a “compliance-first” operating model, rather than relying solely on offshore or cross-border licensing structures commonly used across the crypto industry.
🇺🇸 MoonPay launches MoonPay Trade, a technology platform that lets any application, financial institution, or enterprise access digital assets and move value across 200+ blockchains and protocols through a single API. The company also announced that MoonPay Gateway now supports USDH and USDC on Hyperliquid, allowing users to fund positions directly from fiat without bridges, swaps or extra transactions for faster access to trading liquidity.
🇯🇵 Polymarket aims for prediction market approval in Japan by 2030. The decentralized prediction market platform has appointed a representative in the country and is aiming for government approval by 2030, Bloomberg report said, citing people familiar with the matter who asked not to be named.
🇺🇸 NEAR Protocol has launched confidential payments on its Intents platform, enabling private cross-chain swaps between NEAR and ETH. The new feature aims to improve transaction privacy and simplify user experience for decentralized multi-chain transfers.
PARTNERSHIPS
🌍 Mellow has launched Contractor Management, powered by Airwallex, to help companies hire, manage, and pay global contractors from a single platform. The solution combines onboarding, compliance, and cross-border payments across 150+ countries. Read on
🇲🇽 Aevi and Getnet have launched a global partnership to simplify international expansion for enterprise merchants and ISVs. Starting in Mexico, the collaboration combines payment orchestration with local acquiring capabilities through a single integration model.
🇺🇸 FIS and InvestCloud announced a long-term partnership to deliver a modern wealth management platform combining advisor tools, client digital experiences and AI capabilities in one environment. The solution will integrate with FIS core wealth platforms, helping institutions modernize front-office operations without replacing existing infrastructure.
🇺🇸 Acceleron and Banking Circle US partner to help community banks modernize international wire processing, automating inbound payments and reducing manual work. The integration aims to speed settlements, improve data quality, and expand FX capabilities for banks.
DONEDEAL FUNDING NEWS
🇺🇸 Farther raises $150M Series D, led by General Atlantic, to scale Intelligent Wealth Management. With this funding, the firm anticipates continued expansion of its platform capabilities and further innovation to better support advisors and clients, leveraging General Atlantic’s global wealth management investing experience and track record of scaling high-growth financial services platforms.
🇨🇭 Squid raises $6M to expand consumer product offering on cross-chain infrastructure. The funding will accelerate Squid's expansion into consumer products that make accessing and managing digital assets across blockchains simple enough that users never need to think about the infrastructure underneath.
M&A
🇺🇸 US FinTech Payoneer paid $13 million to acquire Irish employment platform Boundless, with an additional $4 million tied to performance milestones. The deal strengthens Payoneer’s global workforce and compliance capabilities across Europe and beyond. Read more
🇺🇸 SoFi has acquired lendtech startup Peach Finance, expanding its SoFi Technology Solutions division with loan servicing and management capabilities. The deal marks SoFi’s third acquisition this year as it deepens its focus on financial infrastructure services.
MOVERS AND SHAKERS
🇮🇱 Airwallex has appointed Noa Gastfreund to lead its startups and VC sector in Israel as the FinTech expands its support for the local startup ecosystem. Noa brings a wealth of experience in go-to-market (GTM) strategies and ecosystem leadership. The move coincides with the launch of a new program focused on global payments, FX, and cross-border operations.
🇺🇸 FNZ has appointed David Moss as Group Chief Product Officer to lead its global product strategy and support expansion in North America. Moss joins from BNY and will focus on accelerating AI-enabled, modular wealth management solutions across the platform. Continue reading
🇬🇧 Monzo appoints AJ Coyne as its first Chief Marketing Officer as the digital bank expands internationally and grows its customer base to 15.2 million. Coyne, who joined the FinTech in 2024 and previously worked at Spotify and Klarna, will lead marketing during Monzo’s next phase of growth.
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