Finperks Raises $4 Million To Build The Stripe For Prepaid

Hey Payments Fanatic!

Berlin-based FinTech finperks has raised $4 million (€3.4 M) in pre-Seed funding to build what it calls the “Stripe for prepaid.”

The company is targeting a $1.39 trillion (€1.2 T) prepaid payments market that is still fragmented and outdated. The founders previously built Via FinTech, acquired by Paysafe in a nine-figure deal in 2021.

Sebastian Seifert, Founder and Co-CEO, put it clearly. “Banks need cashback to retain and engage users. HR platforms need benefits as a logical extension to upsell clients. None of them wants to build prepaid infrastructure. They want to plug into it.”

Check out below what this milestone means for the Payments and FinTech industry as a whole. Achim Bönsch, Co-CEO and Founder, also shares his perspective👇

Now, finperks wants to solve this with a single API. One integration gives access to 1,000+ brands across Europe, enabling brand-funded cashback, employee benefits like Germany’s €50 tax free Sachbezug, and embedded digital gift cards.

The company says the prepaid market already exceeds €1.2 trillion and continues to grow at double-digit rates. Yet between brands and merchants, there are often five or more intermediaries.

Infrastructure layers keep expanding across payments. This is another one I’ve been watching closely.

Keep scrolling 👇 There’s more movement across the payments landscape below.

Cheers,

Marcel

INSIGHTS

🌎 How a LATAM staffing company stopped losing top talent to broken payments by Noah. In this article, Noah explains how Tenui, a platform connecting Fortune 500 companies with freelance developers across Latin America, improved its payment infrastructure by enabling instant USDC payouts. The solution reduced fees, eliminated payment delays, and helped Tenui retain top talent while simplifying cross-border payment operations.

NEWS

🌏 Mastercard simplifies cross-border payments for Asia Pacific SMEs. Mastercard announced that it is introducing Mastercard Global Commerce Suite for Small Businesses, a set of holistic capabilities powered by Mastercard Move, designed to help banks support the evolving, cross-border needs of time-strapped SMEs.

🇵🇭 TransUnion Philippines and Mastercard collaborate to expand access to responsible credit. The collaboration supports stronger decision‑making, more meaningful customer engagement for lenders, and sustainable growth across the Philippines’ lending ecosystem.

🇩🇪 finperks has raised €3.4 million ($4 million) in a pre-Seed funding round. This new capital will be utilised to expand the engineering team, strengthen brand partnerships, and scale operations across further European markets. Read more

🇬🇧 BOE open to changing stablecoin caps after industry backlash. A senior Bank of England official indicated that UK regulators may reconsider proposed limits on stablecoin holdings after industry backlash. The central bank said it is open to alternative approaches to managing risks.

🇦🇺 Ripple seeks an Australian financial license to 'scale' payments across the region. The license will allow Ripple to oversee settlement, connect customers with local payout partners, and route transactions through a single integration rather than multiple intermediaries.

🌍 The ECB launches Appia, the new infrastructure for integrating tokenized euro payments. The special technological circuit will reduce costs and increase the speed, efficiency, and reliability of financial transactions by making possible trading, clearing, settlement, custody, and related services in a single 'coded file' on a single platform available 24/7, 365 days a year.

🇺🇸 Circle Nanopayments launches on Testnet as the core primitive for agentic economic activity. Nanopayments provides the financial rail for the emerging agentic economy. It lets developers power pay-per-call, pay-per-use, and machine-to-machine flows where agents can send fractions of a cent in USDC nearly instantly, without paying gas fees per individual payment.

🇺🇸 Payoneer and FundPark collaborate to expand dynamic, frictionless credit access for global E-commerce sellers. Through this collaboration, FundPark will provide its AI‑driven digital financing solutions to eligible Payoneer customers. The collaboration enables access to a flexible line of credit offered by FundPark for cross-border e-commerce businesses.

🇮🇳 PayU and CoRover.ai to enable AI voice payments in 100+ Indian languages. The companies said the partnership will allow AI agents to initiate and complete transactions directly within chat or voice interactions. Continue reading

🌏 Global virtual travel card program launched by Visa and Trip.com to make travel payments simpler and more seamless in the Asia Pacific. Through this collaboration, Trip.com Group will introduce a virtual travel card program issued in partnership with Visa via Trip.com Group's FinTech arm, TripLink.

🇨🇦 PayBright invests in Material to expand retail POS ecosystem. Under the agreement, Material will serve as PayBright’s preferred POS solution for retail, adding to the payments company’s more than two dozen existing industry collaborations.

🇺🇸 Wells Fargo files WFUSD trademark for crypto payments and trading. The filing outlines a broad list of potential products and services linked to digital assets, including cryptocurrency trading services, cryptocurrency exchange services, cryptocurrency payment processing, financial brokerage services for cryptocurrency trading, and electronic transfer of virtual currencies.

🇧🇪 Swift accelerates consumer payments transformation with new retail transaction framework. Designed to elevate the cross-border retail payment experience, the initiative promises to deliver next-generation speed, predictability, and affordability to everyday international transactions.

GOLDEN NUGGET

🚨 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐌𝐨𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐞 𝐏𝐚𝐲𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬 𝐑𝐞𝐯𝐨𝐥𝐮𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐢𝐧 𝐋𝐀𝐓𝐀𝐌 — by Getnet 👇Created by Arthur Bedel 💳 ♻️

Mobile is reshaping how Latin America pays — and it’s doing so faster than almost anywhere else in the world.

→ Over 60% 𝐨𝐟 𝐋𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧 𝐀𝐦𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐬 already 𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐦𝐨𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐞 𝐰𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲𝐝𝐚𝐲 𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬.

→ Brazil’s 𝐏𝐈𝐗 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐞𝐝 64𝐁+ 𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐢𝐧 2024, with 87% of adults adopting it.

→ By 2025, 𝐋𝐀𝐓𝐀𝐌 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 424𝐌 𝐦𝐨𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐞 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐞𝐭 𝐮𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐬, unlocking an unprecedented digital-first payments base.

𝐇𝐨𝐰 𝐈𝐭 𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐬 — 4 Growth Engines

🔸 𝐌𝐨𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐞 𝐖𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐬 — Apps like Mercado Pago, Nubank, and PicPay securely store cards and are overtaking cards in Argentina’s e-commerce market.

🔸 𝐖𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐞𝐬 — Smartwatches and NFC devices are still nascent but forecasted to surge in Brazil and Argentina in the next 5 years.

🔸 𝐈𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐏𝐚𝐲𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬 — PIX is now a default in Brazil and spreading fast across Colombia and Argentina. Transactions settle in real time, 24/7.

🔸 𝐐𝐑 𝐂𝐨𝐝𝐞𝐬 — Nearly 30% of PIX payments start with QR scans; Mexico’s CoDi and Colombia are racing to scale similar infrastructures.

𝐑𝐞𝐠𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐄𝐜𝐨𝐬𝐲𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐦:

🇧🇷 Brazil: PIX, Mercado Pago, Nubank, PicPay, PagBank, Santander Brasil

🇲🇽 Mexico: SPEI, Nubank, Mercado Pago, CoDi, Santander México

🇨🇱 Chile: Khipu, MACH, Mercado Pago, Santander

🇦🇷 Argentina: Ualá, MODO, Mercado Pago, Santander

🇺🇾 Uruguay: AstroPay, Prex, Toké, Mercado Pago, Santander

🌎 Leading PSPs shaping the rails:

→ DEUNA — reshaping how AI is being used in Payments & Fintech, building the next-gen infrastructure for global merchants, providing payment intelligence + orchestration as a service.

→ dLocal & EBANX — enabling international merchants to reach LATAM consumers through a single API that simplifies FX, settlement, and tax.

→ Getnet & Santander — innovating in merchant acquiring local payment methods and financial services with deep banking integrations.

→ AstroPay — bridging global merchants and LATAM consumers through prepaid cards, wallets, and loyalty tools.

→ PPRO — providing global payment infrastructure by aggregating local methods and offering PSPs “payments as a service”.

𝐁𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐟𝐢𝐭𝐬

→ Lower costs & faster settlement for merchants.

→ Financial inclusion for millions who never had access to cards.

→ Cross-border growth powered by multi-currency rails.

→ New digital opportunities — loyalty programs, embedded finance, and social commerce via Pay-by-Link.

The message is clear: in LATAM, mobile isn’t an alternative. Merchants that embed local rails and mobile-first methods will grow. Those that don’t risk being locked out of the fastest-growing payments revolution.

Source: Getnet

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