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Fintech in 5 - Apple to Open iPhone NFC to Third-Parties

This week, the EU is forcing Apple to open its iPhone NFC to third parties, Mastercard is launching a new AI model to detect fraud, AML regulation is changing, and more.

Author

Benjamin Schroeder
February 08, 2024

Hey 👋,

Welcome back to Fintech in 5 - I hope you’re having a great week.

Lots of special things in the works for Fintech in 5 over the coming year, so after my extended break, let’s get back into it.

This week, the EU is forcing Apple to open its iPhone NFC to third parties, Mastercard is launching a new AI model to detect fraud, AML regulation is changing, and more.

To stay up-to-date with Fintech in 5 news, follow me on LinkedIn.

Let's dive in 👇

In This Edition:

💰 Fundraising

📰 Top Stories :

💰 Fundraising

🇪🇺 Top Deals in Europe Last Week

7 deals were reported in Europe in the past week, raising a total of €124 million. Two deals were announced in France, while the Netherlands, the UK, Switzerland, Germany and Spain had one each.

👑 DataSnipper Raises $100M at $1B Valuation

This week, datasnipper, an intelligent automation platform for audit and finance, takes the crown for the biggest round of funding. The Amsterdam-based company has become a unicorn ($1B+ valuation) after their $100M Series B funding round led by Index Ventures. This milestone comes after the company doubled its customer base and revenue, driven by its effective solution to the auditing sector's challenges.

DataSnipper claims to automate up to 90% of routine tasks, enhancing productivity and reducing errors. Serving over 400,000 users globally, including top firms like Deloitte and Ernst & Young, DataSnipper is expanding into new areas like internal audit and tax advisory. Its latest products aim to improve collaboration and automate data analysis, furthering its mission to revolutionize the audit process by making it faster, more accurate, and strategically focused.

→ Silicon Canals

📰 Top Stories :

🇪🇺 Apple to Open iPhone NFC to Third-Party Wallets in EU Antitrust Concession

  • Apple has committed to allowing third-party mobile wallet and payment providers access to the iPhone's NFC capabilities in the European Economic Area (EEA), a move aimed at addressing a European Commission antitrust investigation.

  • This concession ends the exclusive access of Apple Pay and Apple Wallet to the iPhone's NFC payment features, following the Commission's accusation of Apple restricting competition in the mobile payments market.

  • The proposed commitments, which are to last for 10 years, could lead to fines of up to 10% of Apple's worldwide annual turnover if not honored, signaling a significant shift in Apple's approach to NFC access and mobile payments within the EU.

🇺🇸 Mastercard Launches AI to Detect Fraud

  • Mastercard has launched Digital Intelligence Pro, an advanced AI model using a recurrent neural network (RNN), to enhance fraud detection and address the issue of high false positive rates that cost merchants $443B annually.

  • The RNN model is trained on data from 125 billion annual transactions in Mastercard's network, utilizing the history of a cardholder’s merchant visits to more accurately predict fraudulent activities, aiming to reduce false positives by improving detection rates by 20% on average.

  • This innovation could potentially save merchants $90B annually in false declines, making a significant impact on reducing legitimate transaction rejections and improving the shopping experience for consumers.

🇫🇷 Crédit Agricole Takes 7% Stake in Worldline

  • Crédit Agricole has acquired a 7% stake in Worldline to form a strategic partnership focused on creating a joint venture in merchant payments in France, aiming to establish a significant player in the merchant payment services sector.

  • This partnership intends to leverage Worldline's technological expertise and Crédit Agricole's extensive distribution network, despite Worldline's recent market challenges, including a significant drop in market value and share price volatility.

  • The collaboration, which marks Crédit Agricole as a top three shareholder in Worldline, is part of both companies' strategy to enhance their positions in the European payments market, with plans for the joint venture to launch later this year pending regulatory approvals.

🇧🇷 Nubank Aims to Dominate Latin America's Financial Sector

  • Nubank CEO David Vélez anticipates the neobank becoming Latin America's largest financial institution, with the company currently ranked in the top five and projecting $1 billion in yearly profits amid expansion into Mexico and Colombia.

  • In Mexico, where over half of the adult population is unbanked, Nubank is enhancing financial inclusion by offering personal loans, noting that around 20% of smartphone-connected adults have engaged with their services.

  • The company's efforts are part of a broader movement to modernize financial services in Latin America, with Nubank's expansion highlighting the significant demand for accessible financial products in a region marked by low banking penetration rates.

🇪🇺 EU Reaches Provisional Agreement on Comprehensive AML Measures

  • The EU has provisionally agreed on an extensive anti-money laundering (AML) package, aiming to protect against money laundering and terrorist financing by expanding regulations to include the crypto sector and setting an EU-wide cash payment limit of €10,000.

  • New measures include broadening the definition of obligated entities to encompass sectors like football and luxury goods, enhancing due diligence for high-net-worth individuals, and establishing harmonized rules for beneficial ownership to ensure transparency and prevent exploitation through complex ownership structures.

  • The agreement introduces stringent cross-border and correspondent banking due diligence, mandates immediate access for Financial Intelligence Units to various information sources, and emphasizes the importance of both EU and national risk assessments in bolstering the EU's defense against illicit financial activities.

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Have a great rest of your week,