Fintech Focus For December 2, 2020

Quote To Start The Day: It’s possible to transcend anything that doesn’t kill you.

Source: David Goggins

One Big Thing In Fintech: The digitization of financial markets in Africa will continue to accelerate as local investors seek diversified access to higher-yield financial products.

That's according to Chaka founder and CEO Tosin Osibodu, who suggest investors are yearning for ways to hedge against the effects of currency depreciation and inflation.

“Something unique about the African market is that it’s virgin,” Osibodu said. “We’re about a year old, so there is no before and after. It is just happening.”

Riding on the secular trend of digitization, Chaka is a fintech that offers Nigerians stock trading in more than 40 countries through its API- and app-based platform.

With as little as $10, Chaka users can invest fractionally in over 4,000 global stocks and ETFs.

“We came to market because of a problem Nigerians faced for a long time,” the company's founder said of leveraging his data engineering background to benefit Nigeria’s emerging fintech infrastructure.

“Nigerians couldn’t access this stuff. We noticed there were a lot of barriers when it came to [know your customer], payments and in general the financial technology.”

Source: Benzinga

Other Key Fintech Developments:

• JPM, Lloyds look into buying Starling.
• M1 Finance launches Smart Transfers.
• What PNC has in store for BBVA tech.
• Backbase unveils tech, BaaS solution.
• Bitfinex Borrow intros euro, yen loans.
• Public intros holiday stock giveaways.
• InfoReach partners with QuantHouse.
• Coinbase intros incentives for liquidity.
• Nordigen intros Tink, Plaid challenger.
• LendUp launches digital banking tech.
• FaaS Rapyd has launched in Thailand.
• BlockFi intros Visa cards, BTC awards.
• Mapping out world’s crypto exchanges.
• TORA improves its offer with Liquidnet.
• ConnexPay pushes new payment tech.

Watch Out For This: In a first for a major bourse, the Nasdaq stock exchange is seeking United States authority to require more diversity in the boardrooms of Nasdaq-listed companies or to explain why they can not.

Source: Al Jazeera

Interesting Reads:

• Salesforce acquires Slack for $27.7B.
• Virus to increase humanitarian needs.
• DoorDash aims to add $11B to value.
• Did you know alcohol is a carcinogen?
• TikTok stars joined ReKTGlobal team.
• OECD cuts global forecast on COVID.
• Sun ejects biggest solar flare in years.
• Google Maps introduced a news feed.
• Microsoft patents body language tech.
• AWS introduced the Panorama device.
• Elon Musk plans to attempt Mars flight.
• US eyes vaccine amid surge in cases.
• Credit Suisse spying on more workers.

Market Moving Headline: While the equity markets continue to climb, the biggest beneficiaries have been the indices and constituents that were largely left behind earlier in the year. In short, rotation has been the name of the game in recent weeks. Investors and traders are adapting to the prospect of a different future, one influenced by the availability of an effective COVID-19 vaccine. Many have decided to allocate capital in new ways as a result.

Source: Cboe