Venture Capital

Nov
03

LoanDolphin completes $1.1 million seed funding

LoanDolphin, Australia’s leading loan bidding platform, has successfully raised a total of $1.1 million from key investors to expand its presence in major capital cities in a bid to claim a stake in Australia’s $1.5 trillion home loan market.   Strategic investor Barry Lambert provided $1 million, with the remainder from fintech investment firm H2 Ventures.   Mr Lambert founded Count Financial in 1980 and sold the company to Commonwealth Bank in 2011 for $373 million.   The seed funding values the Sydney-based fintech startup at $5 million post capital raising rounds.   LoanDolphin is a free online platform for people to refinance or obtain new home loans at rates […]

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Nov
03

EY FinTech Australia Census 2016

FinTech Australia and EY Sweeney release the most comprehensive analysis of Australia’s fintech ecosystem to date, the EY FinTech Australia Census 2016 FinTech Australia and EY Sweeney are today releasing the inaugural EY FinTech Australia Census 2016, the most comprehensive and detailed report on the Australian fintech industry to date. The research was formally launched in Melbourne today by EY’s Anita Kimber at FinTech Australia’s national summit, Collab/Collide 2016 in partnership with LaunchVic. This significant piece of research was commissioned by FinTech Australia as part of their efforts to foster a thriving fintech ecosystem in Australia. The report identifies important characteristics of the Australian fintech industry, and establishes a set […]

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Nov
01

Thorney invests in Timelio fund for invoice financing

Thorney Investment Group has seeded the Timelio Capital Fund, a new unit trust to be offered to institutional investors seeking a diversified exposure to the emerging asset class of invoice financing. Thorney and Timelio, a Melbourne-based fintech that has built a peer-to-peer platform allowing small businesses to access funding based on the amount of money owed to them on unpaid invoices, expect the new fund to grow to $100 million over the short-to-medium term. Timelio has also raised $5 million in fresh equity, backed by Thorney and former ANZ Banking Group director John Dahlsen, a recent critic of the big banks. Timelio has facilitated $45 million in funding for small […]

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Oct
20

AtlasTrend completes $2.8m capital raising

Australian based fintech and global equities fund manager, AtlasTrend, is pleased to advise that it has completed a capital raising of $2.8m to grow its online investment platform and progress its continued disruption of the trillion dollar traditional funds management sector. AtlasTrend provides retail and sophisticated investors with online access to proprietary investment insights and an easy way to invest in four exclusive global equities funds, with portfolios aligned to global investment megatrends focused on where the world is heading – Big Data, Online Shopping, Healthy Lifestyle, and Baby Boomers. AtlasTrend completed the capital raising through new and existing investors, with notable investors including some of the early backers of […]

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Oct
14

H2Ocean pulls float, but commits to raising new private fund

The listing of what was set to be Australia’s first public venture capital company, H2Ocean, has been pulled, but the firm intends to proceed with raising a private fund. As revealed by Street Talk, the company – the brain child of H2 Ventures founders Ben and Toby Heap – was unable to raise enough capital. H2Ocean had been trying to raise between $27.5 million and $55 million to establish a portfolio of 15 to 50 fintech start-ups, but Ben Heap told The Australian Financial Review the firm had fallen just short of its target. Rather than persist with a lower amount, Mr Heap said it was better to withdraw the […]

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Oct
12

Property crowdfunding start-up CrowdfundUP closes funding round and eyes China

Property crowdfunding platform CrowdfundUP has closed a $2.1 million capital raise to build its team and grow its market presence locally and in China. The funding comes as the property sector faces disruption from increasing numbers of new entrants with disruptive business models such as Purplebricks Australia, PropertyNow and BRICKX. The investment in CrowdfundUP has been led by asset development and management firm Positive Investment Enterprise, which has a focus on property development, venture capital and funds management throughout Australia, China and the US.Professional services firm BDO also participated. CrowdfundUP founder and managing director, Jack Quigley, said the business would expand rapidly in the next year, with plans in place […]

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Oct
11

Pushpay ASX float is a leap of faith

It used to involve putting cash into the collection plate but now giving to a church can happen with a few taps on a mobile phone. The co-founder of Pushpay, which will list on the Australian Securities Exchange on Wednesday, says the fintech’s revenue will triple and its cash flow become positive by the end of 2017, driven by more members of religious congregations in the United States making donations through smartphones. Pushpay, which offers a payments application to individual churches throughout the US, completed a $54 million placement to local institutions through Ord Minnett last week in a bookbuild at $2.09 a share. The offer was revealed by Street […]

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Oct
07

NAB is opening its data vaults for fintechs

NAB chief executive Andrew Thorburn says he will support moves to require banks to share customer data, a key requirement for fintechs to compete with the big players. “We welcome competition,” he told the House of Representatives economics committee. “That’s how this bank has survived and competed for 150 years. “And now we’ve got new competition, fintechs that are coming at us and we welcome that too. You have to lift and get better and that’s good for customers.” Thorburn also supports greater account portability, where a customer could more easily move to a new bank without having to change automatic payments. In the UK, the Competition and Markets Authority […]

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