Fathom4sight Newsletter: This week's FinTech news curated by Fathom4sight!

Payments

New York-based virtual card and spend management platform, Extend, closes record 2022 with new products, partners and expansion into Canada - Extend adds executives, doubles user base as customers add the power of virtual cards to their business credit cards of choice. | Global Fintech Series

PayPal to lay off 2000 employees - The job cuts were announced by president and CEO Dan Schulman in a memo shared with the workforce, who said the company had to reshape to address the challenging macro-economic environment. | Finextra

Worldline, a global leader in payments services, Signs a Multi-year Deal with ING - Under the extended agreement, ING is outsourcing issuing processing operations to Worldline. Relying on its technology and know-how, Worldline will help ING focus on its core expertise, ultimately supporting the bank’s growth ambitions. | Fintech Finance News

Montreal originated San Francisco-based AppDirect acquires TBI to expand offerings for technology advisors - AppDirect has acquired third-party technologies distributor Telecom Brokerage Inc. (TBI) as the former looks to scale its offerings for technology advisors. The acquisition closed on January 31 for an undisclosed amount. | Twitter & Betakit

Montreal-based Le Panier Bleu partners with Nuvei to enhance payments for its marketplace platform in Quebec - Nuvei for Platforms is bringing enterprise-level payments solutions to eCommerce businesses in the Canadian province to accelerate SME revenue growth. | Financial Post

Amazon, Stripe expand payments partnership - Amazon has selected Stripe to assist with payment processing across its numerous businesses. The partnership is an expansion of a 2017 deal and will see Stripe help with volume across Amazon Prime, Audible, and Amazon Pay as well as other businesses of the e-commerce giant. | Bank Automation News

Lightspeed faces net loss of $814.8M USD, sends groundhog day signal - Lightspeed makes slight revenue gain but faces recessionary pressures in the marketplace. Perhaps it wasn’t the best signal as Lightspeed Commerce’s third fiscal quarter earnings report season kicked off with the announcement of a net loss of $814.8M. | Betakit

Shopify invests in US-based e-commerce analytics aggregator - Triple Whale - Shopify has made an investment into US-based Triple Whale’s Series B round as the e-commerce giant continues to fund companies that support the Shopify merchant system. Triple Whale’s data platform allows Shopify store owners to unify their business metrics into one dashboard. | Betakit

Checkout.com shakes up leadership to take on Stripe - Online payments firm Checkout.com has announced changes to its leadership team as it prepares its strategy to bolster US expansion and take on Stripe. | Finextra

Canadian PayTech platform DirectPay enables Interac e-Transfer payments on Xero, a global small business platform - DirectPay solves a common pain point for businesses by making it quick and easy to accept e-Transfer payments. The benefits of offering DirectPay include faster payments, reduced administrative work and lower payment processing costs when compared to other payment methods in Canada. | Newswire

Financial Institutions

US Bank launches automated payroll deposit feature for new accounts - US Bank has launched DIY direct deposit, allowing new current account holders to switch their payroll direct deposit In just minutes. The feature is available to clients opening new US Bank Smartly Checking or Safe Debit checking accounts and utilizes infrastructure powered by Atomic, a provider of payroll connectivity services. | FinTech Futures

Spanish banking giant BBVA migrates its investment banking platform to the cloud with AWS - BBVA says the AWS platform “provides greater computing power” to make calculations related to financial markets faster and more accurate. In addition, the use of this new platform and the pay-per-use model will allow BBVA to significantly reduce service costs. | FinTech Futures

CGI and National Bank of Canada expand their partnership - CGI and National Bank of Canada announced they are expanding their long-standing partnership, as CGI acquires the intellectual property of the Bank’s in-house financial planning solution currently used by the Bank’s financial advisors. | FinTecBuzz

CIBC Innovation Banking President, Mark McQueen to depart for "next adventure" - In a statement, McQueen said: “With the fifth anniversary of CIBC’s acquisition of Wellington Financial now in the rear-view mirror, I’ve decided that it’s the appropriate time to chart my next adventure.” | Betakit

Wealth Management

Conquest Planning raises $24M to expand AI Financial Advisor Solution to US, UK markets - Winnipeg-based startup Conquest Planning, which uses artificial intelligence (AI) to provide wealth management solutions, has raised $24 million CAD in all-equity Series A funding from a group of financial market investors. | Betakit

Russell Investments Canada launches tax-managed investment solutions for Canadian investors - Russell Investments Canada Limited has launched the firm’s first two tax-managed investment solutions for the Canadian market, extending the global asset manager’s time-tested approach to help investors keep more of what they earn. Financial advisors and investors across Canada can now access innovative solutions that leverage the global investment firm’s tax-managed expertise. | Global Fintech Series

Crypto & DeFi

Toronto-based Coinsmart to seek monetary damages from Coinsquare following collapse of acquisition deal - CoinSmart has accepted that its Coinsquare acquisition deal is not going to happen anymore, but the Canadian crypto trading platform is not happy about it and plans to seek recompense. | Betakit

Clients of Chicago-based crypto trading firm Cumberland can now trade crypto denominated in Canadian dollars - The move comes one week after Cumberland inked a deal with Canada-based crypto platform BitBuy to boost liquidity on that exchange. | CoinDesk

Lending

Toronto-based FinTech firm Paperstack secures $9M in equity and debt to fuel pivot into e-commerce lending - Amid this challenging market environment, Paperstack sees “a lot of opportunity” to expand its e-commerce lending operations and help fill the gap as other players cut back, and the startup has closed $9 million CAD in equity and debt hoping to do just that. | Betakit

Vancouver-based FinTech Levr.ai raised $1M to transform the way businesses access and manage loans - Levr.ai uses accounting and banking APIs to accelerate the process of looking for a loan, applying for a loan, and managing existing loans. The APIs automate a significant portion of the processes along with Levr.ai proprietary resources and content within the platform. | Fintech.ca

Venture Capitals

Investor liquidity issues are putting the squeeze on Canadian startups - These liquidity issues are putting the squeeze on some Canadian VCs, the immediate harm is to Canadian startups that are looking to fundraise—including those that had closed rounds, only to never see the funds materialize or be clawed back. | Betakit

Vancouver-based VC Raven Indigenous Capital Partners announced the final closing of its $100M CAD second fund, topping its initial target of $75M - Raven Capital’s second fund is meant to build on the venture firm’s Fund I, investing exclusively in Indigenous enterprises that demonstrate commercial viability, potential for scale, and measurable community benefit streams. | Betakit

Insurance

Montreal-based InsurTech, Equisoft acquired CompuOffice Software to add to tools available on its advisor platform - The Canadian firm’s core offering is its LifeGuide product that enables advisors to access product data from Canadian insurance carriers and find the best fit for clients. Ultimately, this will be integrated within the Equisoft/connect CRM tool. | Wealth Professional

Challenger Banks

UK-based Revolut is launching crypto staking for 25M users for DOT, XTZ, ADA & ETH - UK-based neo-banking challenger that claims 25 million customers worldwide, has soft-launched crypto ‘staking’ for customers in the UK and European Economic Area. A full launch of staking will begin being rolled out this week, AltFi understands, allowing users of its app to earn income on crypto assets with the product in 'soft testing'. | AltFi

Businesses

Jobber raises $100M in General Atlantic-led deal, defying Canadian tech sector woes - The funding for the Edmonton company, which sells an online platform for small home-services providers to run their businesses, was led by U.S. private equity giant General Atlantic and backed by past investors Summit Partners, Version One Ventures and Tech Pioneers Fund. | The Globe and Mail