Square
What to make of Stripe’s possible $100B valuation
This is The TechCrunch Exchange, a newsletter that goes out on Saturdays, based on the column of the same name. You can sign up for the email here. Welcome to a special Thanksgiving edition of The E
Square and PayPal earnings bring good (and bad) news for fintech startups
Earnings season is racing past us, with the big ride-hailing companies’ numbers in, all of the Big Five having wrapped their reporting and lots of SaaS numbers in the market. But amidst all the
PayPal’s earnings don’t excite Wall Street, but bring good news for consumer fintech
PayPal’s stock is down in after-hours trading after reporting third-quarter earnings that beat expectations. It’s not immediately clear why PayPal is losing ground, although it could stem
Payments services company Finix adds $30 million to its Series B
Finix, a startup that provides payments-related services to other companies, announced it has extended its Series B financing with a $30 million investment led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Ameri
Robinhood raises $200M more at $11.2B valuation as its revenue scales
Robinhood announced this morning that it has raised $200 million more at a new, higher $11.2 billion valuation. The new capital came as a surprise. Astute observers of all things fintech will recall t
Square’s Cash App tests new feature allowing users to borrow up to $200
Cash App, the peer-to-peer payments service from Square, is giving select users a way to get short-term loans. The company said it’s only testing the feature with around 1,000 users for now. But
Former COO sues Pinterest, accusing it of gender discrimination, retaliation and wrongful termination
Pinterest’s former chief operating officer has filed a lawsuit accusing the company of gender discrimination. Françoise Brougher, who says she was abruptly fired from the company in April, is suing
As e-commerce accelerates, fintech startups raised record $100M rounds in Q2
Reading headlines here and there, one might assume that venture capital interest in fintech startups is setting records every quarter. After all: Didn’t Robinhood raise $280 million and $320 mil
PayPal and Venmo QR Code checkout is coming to 8,200 CVS stores in Q4
PayPal has struck a deal with CVS Pharmacy to offer the ability to check out using PayPal’s payment services, including both PayPal and Venmo, at the register. The company announced this morning
Revolut partners with Paxos to bring cryptocurrency trading to the US
Neobank Revolut launched in the U.S. a couple of months ago. The startup is slowly catching up with features that are available in the U.K. and Europe. This time, Revolut is adding cryptocurrency trad
Square acquires European peer-to-peer payment app Verse
Square acquired Verse, a Spanish peer-to-peer payment app that works across Europe. Terms of the deal are undisclosed. According to Crunchbase, Verse had raised $37.6 million from Spark Capital, eVent
Snapchat redesigns its app with new action bar
Snap is unveiling some important changes for Snapchat at its Snap Partner Summit. The navigation has been rethought with a new action bar at the bottom that lets you access Snap Map and Snap Originals
Extra Crunch Live: Join Roelof Botha for a live Q&A on May 6 at 2pm ET/11am PT
23andMe. MongoDB. Eventbrite. Evernote. Bird. Square. Tumblr. Unity. YouTube. Xoom. Roelof Botha has had a seat on each of these companies’ boards, but his list of investments is much, much long
8 top fintech VCs discuss COVID-19 trends, signals and opportunities
In recent years, fintech’s revolution has felt like a rising tide. Behemoths like Stripe and Square edged out banks while newbies like Brex nonchalantly raised nine-figure rounds. Today, however, th
PayPal, Intuit & Square approved to offer loans to small businesses through coronavirus relief program
Fintech companies have been lobbying for weeks to be able to participate in the U.S. government’s emergency lending program for small businesses. Now those efforts have paid off, as PayPal, Intu
Let’s give tech philanthropists the benefit of the doubt on COVID-19
We’ve spent so long asking tech to turn its attention to real-world problems. Let’s not complain when they do so now.
Jack Dorsey creates $1B COVID-19 relief fund using Square equity
Jack Dorsey announced in a series of tweets today that he is shifting $1 billion in his Square equity to create a fund dedicated to COVID-19 relief. The Twitter and Square CEO is calling the fund Star
Oura raises $28 million for its health and sleep tracking ring
Smart rings are still a relatively young category in the wearable hardware world, but the Oura Ring seems to be a standout in terms of early success. The Oura Ring hardware is sleek and packed with se
Twitter CEO’s weak argument why investors shouldn’t fire him
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey might not spend six months a year in Africa, claims the real product development is under the hood and gives an excuse for deleting Vine before it could become TikTok. Today he
6 strategic stages of seed fundraising in 2020
Seed fundraising is rarely easy, but it certainly used to be a lot less complicated than it is today. In a simpler world, a seed investor (or maybe two) would lead a round, which meant that they would