Regtech Salv, with its suite of tools to help banks and service companies fight financial crime, has raised €3.9m in new funding, bringing its capital raised this year to €7.9m and total funding to €12.1m. The round includes investments from new and existing investors and is a testament to a strong year for the Estonian-based regtech, which is on track to double its revenue in 2023 compared to 2022.

The investment will fuel Salv's expansion in the UK, a market currently experiencing a sharp increase in Authorised Push Payment (APP) fraud, where criminals use social engineering attacks involving impersonation to trick consumers or businesses into transferring money to their accounts. In 2022, the UK lost over £1.2 billion to fraud, with APP fraud accounting for 40% of those losses. According to data from UK Finance – despite a marginal 1% drop in losses to APP fraud in the first half of 2023 – the volume of cases surged by 22% this year. Smaller banks and payment firms, often with less robust fraud detection and prevention systems, are particularly vulnerable. 

Salv's suite of products gives players big and small the necessary tools to detect, prevent, and stop fraud, money laundering, and terrorist financing. Salv is used by 53 financial institutions across 12 countries. Providers, including LHV Bank, Swedbank, and SEB, rely on Salv for customer and sanctions screening, real-time inbound and outbound transaction monitoring, and risk scoring.

In response to raising APP fraud, the UK’s Payment Systems Regulator will introduce mandatory reimbursement for APP fraud victims next year, placing equal liability on both sending and receiving payment companies. So far, most banks and payment firms have overlooked inbound transaction monitoring, only focusing on funds leaving their client’s accounts. This represents an important growth opportunity for Salv. 

Taavi Tamkivi, Founder and CEO of Salv, commented: “As the UK moves towards shared responsibility for APP fraud refunds, financial institutions must adapt. Our suite, particularly the inbound monitoring feature, is critical for detecting fraudulent activities and money mule accounts, thereby reducing the financial institution’s liability. This feature, along with tools like our Bridge platform, is tailored to meet the evolving regulatory demands, and the soon-to-launched AI-based no-code rule generator will enable financial institutions to swiftly adapt to new criminal behavior.” 

Currently, in its final phase of testing, the AI-based no-code rule generator is set for launch in Q2 next year. Developed using data from existing manually created monitoring rules that have been validated and improved with transactional data, the tool allows for the implementation of new transaction monitoring rules without requiring developer support. 

Salv’s toolkit also includes Bridge, a fully GDPR-compliant collaborative crime-fighting platform, enabling rapid tactical information exchange between its members. In Estonia, the Bridge network covers 99% of the market and contributes to the prevention of 50% of fraud cases and achieving recovery rates for stolen funds for APP fraud victims as high as 80%. These figures significantly surpass the UK's current estimated baseline of 5%. Salv will initiate a closed pilot for a similar Bridge network in the UK early next year, in collaboration with a global banking group.  

Temenos today announced that Lesha Bank, an investment bank based in Qatar has migrated to the latest Temenos core banking platform to enhance its wealth management and investment banking services.

The move enables Lesha Bank, a long-standing Temenos client, to get to the modern API-driven, cloud-native technology and to have access to the latest banking capabilities from Temenos and the Exchange ecosystem. 

Running on the latest platform gives Lesha Bank the tools to streamline its processes in offering innovative Shari’a-compliant investment opportunities and accelerate its digital initiatives, with personalization driven by data and AI.

Temenos’ offers a standardized migration approach, leveraging the proven methodologies and tools to aid clients to migrate fast, smoothly, and with confidence.

The move also enables Lesha Bank to leverage new functional capabilities to reduce the number of local customizations. For example, the bank has been able to move its SWIFT processing including securities settlement to core banking using the latest securities components as standard. This delivers improved functionality with a significant increase in straight-through processing and transaction processing time.

Mohammed Al Emadi, Chief Executive Officer of Lesha Bank, commented: “We are delighted to have completed this major system modernization with Temenos. To be live on the new platform so quickly is a huge achievement and a giant leap forward for the bank. Temenos propels our system towards the most advanced core technology with best-in-class banking and payments capabilities.”  

William Moroney, Managing Director for Middle East and Africa, Temenos, said: “We are proud to support Lesha Bank and their vision to become a global leader in Shari’a-compliant banking. On the latest Temenos banking platform, Lesha Bank can keep on creating innovative and relevant products quickly and efficiently, and also leverage a modern architecture to take advantage of cloud opportunities for the future.”

Lesha Bank offers high-net-worth individuals and institutional clients a range of tailor-made Shari’a-compliant investment opportunities and innovative financial solutions. It is the first independent Shari’a-compliant bank authorized by the Qatar Financial Center Regulatory Authority (QFCRA) and a listed entity on the Qatar Stock Exchange.

Bitso, the leading financial services company powered by crypto in Latin America, announced that during 2023 reached a 60% growth in its operation of the Bitso Business division, which reached an annualized volume of 8 billion dollars globally.

Over the past year, 1,700 institutional clients traded at least once a month through Bitso. Such organizations use Bitso payment rails and blockchain-based technology for mass pay-ins and pay-outs to employees and suppliers, cross-border payments, and other types of financial operations.

Among other results for 2023, there is also an increase in transactions for the corridor between USA and Mexico (one of the most important in the world and the largest in sending remittances), in which Bitso this year registered a volume of 4.3 billion of dollars, exceeding the 3.3 billion sent in 2022.

This growth has been made possible because during 2023 Bitso globally enabled International Payments, a set of services for transactions between countries. Last July, Bitso announced the integration with Stellar as anchor to enable new transaction corridors between Latin America and Europe, with a direct impact on the economic development and financial inclusion of companies. In addition, a few weeks ago it announced the new eFX with crypto service that allows businesses to carry out transactions with Brazil in stablecoins without the need for a local subsidiary and in compliance with local regulations.

“One of our goals at Bitso is to build the infrastructure for the future of money and open new opportunities for companies from around the world to do business in Latin America,” Santiago Alvarado, General Manager of Bitso Business, said. “We are very optimistic about the future of our institutional business, thanks to our regulatory strength, guaranteed liquidity and our connection with direct rails to the local financial systems of the countries where we operate. Because of this and in combination with the power of blockchain technology, we are confident that we will continue to consolidate in the region.”

Among its institutional clients, Bitso has companies from various sectors, including fintech businesses, payment processors, companies focused on sending remittances, as well as other crypto exchanges in the region. 

In 2024, Bitso will continue to increase the offer of business services to serve more institutional clients and provide technological options that solve different financial needs and help drive the expansion of Latin American businesses and connect them with the rest of the world.

More than a third (36 percent) of people in regulated firms who ‘can’t trust’ electronic ID verification and instead rely on manual checks are leaving their doors open to financial crime, anti-money laundering expert warns.

This statistic - from SmartSearch’s 2023 annual survey of 500 compliance stakeholders - has doubled since their 2022 survey, when 18 percent of people said they couldn’t trust the technology.

Fraser Mitchell, technical director of SmartSearch, said: “This indicates a significant dip in trust for electronic ID verification technology. And yet it is recommended as part of the due diligence process in the Money Laundering and Terrorist Finance Act 2020. We believe many regulated firms may be unaware of this advice, hence the mistrust. In the meantime, criminal gangs are washing billions through the UK’s financial systems. It’s a real concern.”

In regulated firms - including accountancy, property, financial, and legal services - 87 percent of those who use manual methods of ID verification were naively confident that they could identify a fake document such as a passport, driver's license, or utility bill.

The survey revealed a great disparity in this misplaced confidence among the four sectors.

In accountancy firms, more than four out of five (81 percent) compliance stakeholders said they were confident they could spot a fake, compared to a massively overrated 94 percent in property companies. The financial sector was similarly high, with nearly everyone (95 percent) believing they could manually spot a fake ID, despite forgery risks. At 68 percent, the legal sector was the least confident.

The survey also revealed that a quarter (25 percent) of compliance stakeholders in accountancy firms don’t trust electronic ID verification. More than double that number (56 percent) of property professionals don’t trust it, which is nearly five times the number (13 percent) of people in property who claimed not to trust electronic ID verification in 2022.

In the financial services sector, 40 percent of compliance stakeholders said they don’t trust the technology. That’s double the number (20 percent) of people who distrusted it the year before.

Trust in electronic ID verification within the legal sector dipped only slightly compared to the other regulated firms, with 23 percent of legal professionals in 2023 saying they mistrust it, compared to 20 percent in 2022.

Nicola Gifford, general counsel at SmartSearch added: “Due diligence processes are critical to helping regulated firms mitigate risk – both financial and reputational. So we must help engender trust in electronic ID verification within these businesses.

“This is our third ‘Electronic Verification (EV) Uncovered’ campaign. Our objective is to address common misconceptions among regulated firms, to lower the barrier to businesses adopting EV as standard practice.” 

AU10TIX, a global technology leader in identity verification and management, today released its Q3 2023 Global Identity Fraud Report. Drawing insights from millions of transactions processed across 249 countries from July to September 2023, the report uncovers significant trends in the world of organized identity fraud. Most notably, AU10TIX detected that professional fraud rings have shifted their focus from crypto to the payments sector. Digital payments saw an alarming 56% increase in fraud while the crypto industry, traditionally a sandbox for fraudsters, experienced an unusual 51% drop. 

AU10TIX attributes these developments to the June introduction of the EU Market in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation. This legislation will end the ‘wild west’ era of crypto in the EU by introducing a new regulatory framework designed to protect investors and consumers. 

Although the new regulations initially target the EU and will not take effect until 2024, many organizations and regions are proactively adopting stricter KYC guidelines to align with the legislation. This is making it more difficult for professional crime organizations to commit fraud in the crypto sector, so they are funneling their efforts into the less regulated sector of payments. 

Among the sectors scrutinized in Q3, the payments sector was the industry most highly targeted by organized fraud groups, responsible for 51% of all financial fraud attacks -- a significant increase from 32% in Q2. In contrast, the crypto industry was responsible for only 23% of attacks, down from 47% in Q2. These findings underscore a clear correlation between regulatory frameworks and the prevalence of fraud.

North America saw the highest volume of payment sector attacks of all regions studied. AU10TIX attributes this to fraudsters continuing to capitalize on the economic recovery and increased spending. APAC was the second most targeted region, which AU10TIX ascribes to rising digital transaction complexity (involving diverse economies and cross-border payments) presenting challenges for identity verification and creating loopholes for fraudsters. 

AU10TIX’s report also compares the frequency of different fraud modes, including document number, personal data, face picture, image template, and facial image capture (selfie). Across all regions, fraud involving selfie capture represented less than 5% of attacks, indicating that fraudsters find this verification method difficult to circumvent. Gartner also notes that facial image capture is a "must-have" for identity verification vendors.

“The unpleasant truth is that publicly available statistics regarding identity fraud refer only to the attacks that traditional IDV solutions can detect,” said Dan Yerushalmi, CEO of AU10TIX. “The actual fraud rate is likely three to 10 times higher, because today’s sophisticated attacks are committed by organized crime groups using AI, deep fakes and other technology to create false IDs nearly indistinguishable from the real thing. The financial well-being and reputation of a business may be severely impacted by the rise of sophisticated identity fraud. Our commitment at AU10TIX is unwavering—to contribute to the global reduction of identity fraud and make the world a better place."

The significant surge in payment sector attacks, particularly in North America, highlights the urgent need for robust legislative measures to safeguard consumers from fraudulent activities. Regulatory bodies in the United States and the Asia-Pacific region must proactively create legislation that bolsters consumer protection in the payments industry.

In the absence of stringent regulations, payment providers must elevate their KYC practices to fortify defenses against escalating fraud risks. AU10TIX remains committed to fostering a secure and resilient financial ecosystem and invites stakeholders to collaborate in this critical endeavor.

Flutterwave, Africa’s leading payments technology company, is excited to announce the appointment of several seasoned leaders from prominent financial services companies, including PayPal, Stripe, American Express, First Data, Western Union, and Square. These appointments reinforce Flutterwave's dedication to risk and compliance to continue growing sustainably and successfully expanding globally.

Amaresh Mohan, Chief Risk Officer, joins Flutterwave as the company’s first Chief Risk Officer, a role he previously held at GoTo Group, Indonesia’s largest digital ecosystem that publicly listed at IDX last year. Amaresh’s 25-year career includes leadership positions at Stripe and PayPal where he was responsible for building risk management capabilities to enable market entries and scaling up in a number of emerging markets globally. Previously, Amaresh has held key roles in leading global banks, including Citibank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, and Bank of America. At Flutterwave, Amaresh will oversee all aspects of Risk Management, including  Compliance, Trust and Safety. He will work closely with the board and Flutterwave leadership  to build a risk-aware culture and strong governance across the company.

Stephen Cheng, EVP Global Expansion and Payment Partnerships, brings over two decades of global experience at Fortune 100 and high-growth regulated financial institutions, building and leading world-class risk and compliance organizations. He has held multiple C-level positions at public and private companies such as American Express, First Data, Green Dot, and Prime Trust. Most recently, Stephen was Chief Risk and Compliance Officer and Chief Executive Officer at Wyre. Stephen will spearhead Flutterwave’s navigation of the ever-evolving global payment systems and facilitate the company’s expansion into new markets globally through acquiring licences and strategic payment partnership initiatives.

Amanda Ortega, Head of Compliance, US, brings more than 20 years of experience in the banking industry, including 12 years as a regulator with the State of Wyoming’s Division of Banking, where she served in various roles, including Chief Bank Examiner and Deputy Banking Commissioner. Prior to Flutterwave, Amanda was a regulatory, audit, and compliance executive for multiple licensed trust companies and money transmitters.  She will be responsible for overseeing Flutterwave’s regulatory standards and compliance in North America.

To further strengthen its risk, compliance, and partnerships teams, the company announced the appointments of several senior-level hires, including Steven Huynh, who has joined as VP, Global Expansion and Payment Partnerships, and is an industry veteran holding compliance, risk, and operational leadership roles at Western Union, Sigue, and Wyre. Chris Davis, who joined as VP, Risk and Compliance Operations, held leadership roles in compliance, risk, and operations at Scottrade and Square/Cash App. Adewale Ayantoye, who joined as VP, Risk Management, previously held a Director-level Financial Crimes Operations role at Etsy and a leadership role in compliance at Square/Cash App. Among them, they have a combined experience spanning over 30 years with expertise across compliance, risk, and partnerships.

These appointments come in a year when Flutterwave doubled down on its expansions into international markets with new licenses in Rwanda, Egypt, Malawi, and, most recently, money transmitter licenses (MTLs) in 13 states in the United States. It will be pivotal for the company's continued focus on operational excellence by investing in risk and compliance, and adhering to the highest regulatory and compliance standards with world-class talent. This focus will fuel sustained growth, payment innovation, and expansion across the globe.

Speaking on the new appointments, Olugbenga 'GB' Agboola, Founder and CEO of Flutterwave, said:  "We are excited to welcome Amaresh, Stephen, Amanda, Steven, Chris and Wale to Flutterwave. This is a big step forward on our journey to build sustainable, safe, and secure payment solutions that connect Africa to the world and vice versa. Their wealth of experience will help us maintain an atmosphere of sustainable growth and a constructive environment for our people. They will help us solidify our commitment to providing excellent payment services to existing and potential enterprises and individuals from across the world.”

InvesTex Credit Union has partnered with leading digital banking provider, Bankjoy to provide a world-class online and mobile banking experience for its members.

Since 1952, InvesTex Credit Union, formerly known as Aldine Teachers Credit Union, has been dedicated to providing the highest quality service for its members while maintaining a solid financial foundation. InvesTex Credit Union strives to develop lasting relationships that support members’ quality of life and overall financial well-being. As a result of the credit union’s unwavering focus on its members, InvesTex has grown significantly over the years and today, manages over $250 million in assets.

Through the partnership with Bankjoy, InvesTex will further its mission of delivering world-class service as its membership continues to grow. The credit union’s members will now have access to Bankjoy’s end-to-end digital banking platform, which includes a robust suite of mobile and online banking features, integrated loan applications, and other advanced functionalities, such as online account opening. With Bankjoy, InvesTex Credit Union will be equipped to offer an intuitive digital banking experience with all the features today’s members expect.

Bankjoy’s platform will integrate directly with InvesTex’s core processing system, Corelation KeyStone. Bankjoy’s platform is seamlessly integrated with the KeyStone core system and designed with the end-user in mind, resulting in a consistent, secure, and intuitive UX for InvesTex’s members, across all digital channels. Bankjoy is the first official Corelation Certified Partner, which makes it fast and easy for credit unions using Corelation for core processing to roll out Bankjoy’s award-winning digital banking suite.

“Since the beginning, InvesTex Credit Union has remained focused on our members and helping them thrive financially. While our focus on our members has not changed since we were founded over 70 years ago, the technologies we use to engage them has evolved over the years,” said Keith Kearney, president and CEO of InvesTex Credit Union. “Our partnership with Bankjoy will give us the modern digital tools we need to continue impressing our members and exceeding their expectations with the highest quality service.”

“By 2025, the number of digital banking users is projected to surpass 216 million and many of these users will access their banking at least once per month or more, according to recent data,” said Michael Duncan, CEO of Bankjoy. “As more consumers increasingly rely on mobile banking apps for their financial needs, credit unions must keep up technologically to keep members satisfied. InvesTex Credit Union is getting ahead of the curve and the team at Bankjoy is proud to support such a reputable institution in its digital transformation efforts.”

Locality Bank, a digital-first community bank, is reinventing local business banking by combining the best of personal relationships with modern technology. The company has partnered with Praxent, a financial technology consulting and engineering firm, to accelerate this ongoing mission by building a data warehousing and business intelligence system to unify and streamline customer data.   

Fort Lauderdale-based Locality Bank empowers local businesses to maximize their potential through user-friendly technology and ongoing innovation. The bank recognized several challenges associated with data existing in silos, such as limitations on ad hoc reporting and limited visibility into comprehensive customer relations. In response, the community bank partnered with Praxent to help build a data warehouse and business intelligence systems to unify customer data. The centralized data platform will allow Locality Bank to create reports more quickly and easily and make more informed, data-driven decisions about customer relationships and the business.

“We pride ourselves on being a modernized version of what a community bank should be – built digitally with local accessibility,” said Corey LeBlanc, Locality Bank Co-Founder and COO/CTO. “Praxent’s impressive skillset and digital-first, future-forward focus aligns closely with our value proposition. As a result of this engagement, we can leverage our data and uncover powerful, real-time insights that will ultimately enhance our already award-winning services for local businesses across South Florida.”

The data warehouse and business intelligence systems will enable Locality Bank to query data from multiple systems beyond its central banking system, helping align products and services to better meet customers’ needs.

“Locality Bank is helping businesses across their region grow and compete, providing digitally optimized banking tools backed by local support,” said Tim Hamilton, CEO and founder of Praxent. “We are proud to build a solid centralized data foundation layer for this community banking leader, leading to stronger relationships and better business decisions.”

Rapid Enterprise, a division of Rapid Finance, an industry leader in delivering automated and scalable Lending-as-a-Service (LaaS) solutions to support the growth and success of small businesses, announced the availability of its SMB Disclosure Service, a standalone Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) Regtech module, to support business lenders and financing companies who do business in Georgia and Florida, ensuring they comply with each state’s new commercial financing disclosure requirements that will take effect on January 1, 2024.

With the passage of Georgia’s Senate Bill 90 and Florida’s HB 1353, both states have joined a growing number of states, including California, Utah, Virginia and New York, that have enacted similar disclosure laws. These commercial financing disclosure laws aim to standardize disclosures for commercial financing below a certain principal financing amount. In both Georgia and Florida, these regulations require certain commercial financing providers to be transparent with transactions of $500,000 or less that occur at least six times per year. The Georgia and Florida laws are similar to Utah’s disclosure laws in that they require a lender to disclose the total dollar cost of the financing, but are not required to disclose an APR like California or New York.

“We’re seeing an increasing number of states passing regulatory legislation rooted in transparency, fair business and borrower protections for businesses,” said Will Tumulty CEO of Rapid Finance. “We are aware that the introduction of new compliance requirements differing between states may be challenging for providers, so we have created SMB Disclosure Service to help meet this challenge and enable providers to standardize regulatory requirements.”

Organizations have the option to integrate their existing loan origination platform with Rapid Finance’s SMB Disclosure API (application programming interface) or utilize a user interface to obtain desired statements. Commercial finance providers can provide customers with disclosures (including calculated APR and fees) that abide by regulations and provide clarity on offerings in either HTML or PDF format. With more states passing similar regulations for SMB financing, Rapid Finance’s API and user interface equips lenders with a way to remain compliant with states’ specific regulatory requirements. Enterprises can focus their attention on building their customer relationships without worrying about not staying compliant with state regulatory requirements.

The SMB Disclosure Service is an offering from Rapid Enterprise, the company’s business segment focused on providing LaaS solutions, technology consulting and custom development offerings to help enterprises accelerate their growth. Rapid Finance’s team is proactively monitoring additional state regulations in this space and will continue to add new states as similar laws come into effect. To learn more, contact EnterpriseSales@rapidfinance.com.

Krishna Chaitanya, Chief Product Officer of Yabx commented “We've been reimagining innovative methods to democratize credit in emerging markets thereby, transforming the way underserved individuals and businesses perceive finance today. Conversational Banking is our key to further solidifying this narrative in Africa, making it more personal and interactive. Our technology is rooted in the belief that everyone seeks honest ways to improve their lives, and our mission is to make that aspiration a reality." 

Werner Lindemann, Senior Vice President of Global Sales at Clickatell said, "This collaboration between Yabx and Clickatell marks a significant moment in enhancing accessibility to financial services across Africa. By using the power of WhatsApp for lending, we're not just breaking barriers but also fostering financial inclusion in a way that empowers individuals. This move aligns with our collective vision of having a sustainable impact and improving the landscape of financial services in Africa."