Fintech has been one of the fastest growing industries for startups over the past few years. Fintech companies range from investing & stock trading apps like Robinhood all the way to banking providers like Monzo.
In Europe, for example, Fintech raised more than any other startup industry in 2020. Fintech companies like Revolut (raised $580 million), Auxmoney (raised $150million), and Checkout.com (raised $150million) have been growing exceptionally fast in 2020.
In 2019, global Fintech funding passed $24.6 billion. Plenty of startups are hiring in this space due to the influx of capital and now seems like an amazing time to join this industry.
Some of the categories that fintech startups are a part of include:
Here is a list of the top 15 fastest growing Fintech startups over the past 12 months, along with some information and stats about them.
Total Funding: $5.6 Billion
Number of Employees: 1281
Category: Capital Markets
Robinhood is a stock brokerage that allows individuals to buy and sell stocks, options, ETFs, and cryptocurrencies with zero commission. Their mission is to democratize finance and to make it possible for anyone to both invest in financial markets and educate themselves on the industry. Robinhood was founded by Vladimir Tenev and Baiju Bhatt in 2013, who both met at Stanford whilst completing their studies.
In February 2021, Robinhood was put under lots of scrutiny when they restricted the trading of multiple stocks (such as GME) due to market volatility. Robinhood was also sued over 20 year old American student trader’s suicide.
Total Funding: $500 Million
Number of Employees: 1000
Category: Digital Banking
Monzo is revolutionizing the banking sector. It is a digital only bank that was founded in 2016 by Tom Blomfield, Jonas Huckestein, Jason Bates, Paul Rippon, and Gary Dolman, who all previously worked at rival Starling Bank. Monzo gained traction as one of the fastest growing crowd-funded campaigns in history and it also offers an entirely new way of banking: an account managed and run entirely through a mobile app.
Monzo reported around $80 million in its latest funding round and reported impressive growth in its relatively new paid accounts.
Total Funding: $1.6 Billion
Number of Employees: 3460
Category: Payments Processing & Networks
Founded by Patrick Collison and Tommy Collison in 2010, Stripe is a financial services and payments company that primarily offers payment processing software and APIs for websites. Stripe is used by millions of companies in over 100 countries, including companies like Amazon, Shopify, and Microsoft.
Stripe’s mission is to increase the GDP of the internet and given its presence in emerging markets around the world, Stripe is well positioned to lead the surge of internet commerce for many years to come.
Total Funding: $51 Million
Number of Employees: 92
Category: Payments Processing & Networks
Dwolla enables businesses to programmatically send and receive funds. With Dwolla, connect to the ACH Network to facilitate payments and instantly verify bank accounts while keeping control of the entire user experience.
Total Funding: $590 Million
Number of Employees: 5800
Category: Payments Processing & Networks
Square was founded by Jack Dorsey in 2009. It builds tools that make it easier to run your business, including payment systems and processes across both hardware and software.
Square stock surged over 240% in 2020 mainly due to the growth of its consumer cash app. Square’s business is focused on a two-sided digital payments ecosystem, with products designed for both merchant sellers and consumer buyers.
Total Funding: $732 Million
Number of Employees: 500
Category: Accounting & Finance
Brex offers business credit cards and cash management accounts to technology companies. It’s main value add is that it is much faster to get an account on its platform than to have to go to a bank and deal with plenty of paperwork.
Brex hit $10 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR) in approximately 18 months after its 2018 launch. In May 2020, Brex acquired three companies and closed yet another round of its own VC funding, for a total of $465 million raised thus far.
Total Funding: $158.7 Million
Number of Employees: 192
Category: Crypto
BlockFi provides a suite of wealth management products for crypto investors, all powered by blockchain technology. Founded in 2017 by Zac Prince and Flori Marquez, BlockFi is building a bridge between cryptocurrencies and traditional financial and wealth management products to advance the overall digital asset ecosystem for individual and institutional investors. BlockFi's platform manages more than $8 billion in assets and has generated tens of millions in interest for clients.
Total Funding: $547 Million
Number of Employees: 1700
Category: Crypto
Coinbase is a digital currency wallet and platform where merchants and consumers can transact with the most popular digital currencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum. It was founded in June 2012 by Brian Armstrong and Fred Ehrsam. Their vision is to be pioneers of the open financial system by bringing more trust and innovation into the space.
Coinbase saw tremendous growth in 2020, mainly due to the rise in price of bitcoin. Coinbase is now estimated to have over $90 billion in assets on its platform and over 43 million registered users.
Total Funding: $237 Million
Number of Employees: 113
Category: Financial Services and Automation
Deserve offers credit products to young individuals and a cloud-based credit card platform for business. Deserve secured a $100 million credit facility from Credit Suisse in 2020, and will use this new funding to meet financial institutions, fintechs and consumers' growing demand for Deserve's digital-first suite of services.
Total Funding: $1.5 Billion
Number of Employees: 824
Category: Digital Banking
Chime is a mobile banking startup that is targeting younger individuals who don’t want to deal with banks that have physical branches and a mountain of paperwork. Chime is also able to differentiate itself from the competition by offering a relatively no fee and overdraft experience, in stark contrast to the incumbents in the space.
Total Funding: $1.4 Billion
Number of Employees: 298
Category: POS & Consumer Lending
Figure is a web-based platform that manages digital assets and can be used for completing financial and investment transactions. The company leverages blockchain, AI, and analytics to deliver innovative home equity release solutions and other products that help improve the financial lives of our customers.
Figure is a San Francisco based company founded by Mike Cagney in December 2017.
Total Funding: $767.5 Billion
Number of Employees: 359
Category: Business Lending & Finance
BlueVine offers innovative lending solutions to small businesses. Since 2013, BlueVine has provided small and medium sized businesses with over $9 billion in financing. BlueVine was founded in 2013 by Eyal Lifshitz.
Total Funding: $296.5 Million
Number of Employees: 204
Category: Personal Finance
GreenLight is a developer of a smart debit card used to help parents monitor their child's spending habits. Greenlight is easier and more flexible than cash, with parental controls that allow families to manage exactly where, and how much their kids can spend.
Since its launch in 2017, the company has managed to set up over 2 million accounts for parents and children, who have saved an estimated $50 million through the app.
Total Funding: $81.7 Million
Number of Employees: 255
Category: Personal Finance
Human Interest offers easy and affordable employee retirement plans. Traditional retirement plans are far too costly and difficult to administer, so Human Interest takes the complexity out and offers plans that are fast & transparent to set up. Additionally, Human Interest also helps employees become more educated about different retirement plan choices available to them. The company was founded in 2015 by Roger Lee.
Total Funding: $627.8 Million
Number of Employees: 981
Category: Asset Management
Carta is an ownership and equity management platform. It helps companies and investors manage their cap tables, valuations, investments, and equity plans.
Do you want to find out what it’s like to be a Software Engineer at Carta? Read an interview we did with Ather Qureshi, a software engineer on their Finance Automation team.
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