At Google I/O 2025, the company announced a major upgrade to online shopping: a new AI-driven feature called agentic checkout, part of its broader AI Mode experience. This marks a shift from search-and-click to AI-assisted shopping, where discovery, decision-making, and even purchasing are increasingly supported by automation; but with the user firmly in control.

Checkout, On Your Terms

Agentic checkout allows users to track a product’s price and set preferences such as size, color, and budget. When the price drops within your set range, Google notifies you. If you confirm, tapping “buy for me” triggers Google to add the item to the merchant’s cart and complete the checkout using Google Pay.

The purchase is made on your behalf, but only after explicit confirmation. You define the parameters, and the AI handles the execution. According to Google, this system is designed to act “when the price is right for you,” offering a balance between automation and agency.

“Our new AI Mode experience is built for every part of shopping; from finding inspiration to buying at the right moment.“

— Lilian Rincon, Vice President, Product Management, Google

While still rolling out across U.S. listings, agentic checkout reflects a broader trend: removing friction from e-commerce by letting AI act as a digital assistant that monitors prices and completes purchases when all conditions are met.

Discovery Reimagined with AI Mode

Agentic checkout is only one part of Google’s new AI Mode, which redefines how users search for and narrow down products. Powered by Gemini and Google’s 50-billion-item Shopping Graph (refreshed over 2 billion times per hour), AI Mode turns general shopping queries into visually rich, dynamic result panels.

For example, ask for a “blue backpack,” and AI Mode responds with personalized product images and listings. Add specifics, like a ‘trip to rainy Scotland,’ and it launches a query fan-out, running parallel searches to determine what features (e.g., waterproofing, portability) matter most. The results update in real time, surfacing highly relevant options from trusted retailers.

This capability is designed to streamline how people shop by reducing guesswork, enabling real-time refinement, and surfacing products that align with nuanced intent.

Smarter Everyday AI, Beyond Shopping

Google’s announcements at I/O 2025 extended well beyond retail. Across its ecosystem, the company introduced AI-powered features designed to simplify daily tasks and decision-making. In Gmail, users will see AI-organized summaries and smart follow-up suggestions. Google Docs adds context-aware writing assistance, offering quick answers and document insights without switching tabs. On Android, a more conversational call screening assistant now engages callers using natural language. In Search, Gemini now supports multi-step reasoning, enabling more complex queries to be answered in a single exchange. And for e-commerce, Google’s new virtual try-on lets users upload a full-body photo to see how clothes from billions of listings would look on them, bringing personalization to a new level in online shopping.

These features share a common thread: AI that works quietly in the background to reduce friction. Whether you’re searching, writing, scheduling, or deciding; Google is positioning AI as a proactive co-pilot, not a tool you have to ask for help.

How Users Were Already Using Google Gemini

Based on a March 2025 Morgan Stanley survey, this data reflects how users were already engaging with Gemini — primarily for product research, price comparison, and shopping — before Google’s latest AI shopping features were announced.

Limited U.S. Rollout

These features; agentic checkout, AI Mode discovery, and virtual try-on are rolling out gradually in the U.S. Google has not announced international availability. Agentic checkout will be introduced over the coming months across product listings. AI Mode’s query fan-out and dynamic visuals will follow a similar timeline. The try-on tool is live now in Search Labs for eligible users.

While still in early stages, these tools suggest a future where AI removes complexity from shopping without compromising control, streamlining the decision journey from inspiration to checkout.

Key takeaways for fintech startups:

These updates reflect broader shifts in AI design that fintech leaders should watch closely.

• Agentic checkout reflects a new model of user-controlled automation: AI completes purchases only after conditions are met and approval is given.
  
  
• Query fan-out shows how simultaneous AI reasoning can surface more relevant results, with potential applications beyond retail.
  
  
• Google’s approach preserves trust by anchoring automation in explicit user action; an important principle for fintech UX.
  
  
• These tools emphasize scalability + personalization, with clear lessons for product teams building AI-assisted workflows.
  

Want to design smarter digital fintech with clear value and no friction? Your Fintech Story helps fintechs build strategy that scales. Reach out to get started.

London-based fintech Ontik (founded in 2023) is tackling one of the last manual corners of the economy – trade credit for wholesale merchants. Co‑founders Chris and John Smith, both with backgrounds in the trade industry, built Ontik to replace pen‑and‑paper invoicing and chasing with a digital platform. “Payment operations built for B2B wholesalers” is how Ontik markets itself: the platform lets builders’ merchants and other traders send branded payment requests, track accounts, and collect money without filing cabinets or spreadsheets.

A Digital Overhaul for B2B Payments

Ontik’s platform automates the full order-to-cash cycle: from issuing credit terms to generating invoices and proof-of-delivery, and sending branded payment links via email, SMS, or WhatsApp. It tracks real-time engagement, auto-follows overdue invoices, and integrates with ERPs like Merlin, Unleashed, and Intact to simplify reconciliation. Clients report collecting payments 30% faster, spending 60% less time on admin, and reducing card fees by 25%.

“Ontik is doing for trade credit what Stripe did for online payments.”

— Sam Endacott, Partner at Firstminute Capital

Targeting the £100 billion UK building materials market, Ontik delivers modern B2B payment tools to a sector long reliant on manual processes. This focus has resonated with investors: in May 2025, the startup raised a $3.7 million seed round led by Firstminute Capital, with backing from FJ Labs, Tiny VC, PT1, and angels like the founders of Slack and Affirm.

Now scaling fast, Ontik has rolled out to 30+ merchant branches and claims over £1 billion in transaction volume in its pipeline. With 30% month-on-month growth and seamless ERP integration, Ontik is positioning itself as the Stripe of trade credit.

Why Ontik’s Strategy Works

Ontik’s success stems from a combination of factors. The Smith brothers’ prior experience in wholesale (including past startup exits) gives them deep domain insight. The product directly addresses a clear pain point – the headache of manual billing – with simple, tangible benefits for busy finance teams. At the same time, Ontik’s use of AI and automation enables it to deliver measurable ROI (e.g. faster payments and lower fees) that customers and investors can easily understand.

Finally, the startup is benefitting from a broader trend: investors are hungry for “vertical fintech” solutions that modernise offline sectors. Ontik’s positioning as a “Stripe for the real economy” highlights how a clear niche focus and strong execution can lead a fintech to rapid growth even in a crowded market.

Key takeaways for fintech startups:

Ontik’s story offers several practical lessons for founders building in fintech:

• Target underserved, traditional sectors with a clear, urgent pain point
  
  
• Leverage domain expertise to design solutions customers actually adopt
  
  
• Integrate with existing tools (like ERPs) to reduce friction in adoption
  
  
• Show tangible ROI with real numbers (e.g. time saved, faster payments)
  
  
• Build investor trust through clear positioning, strong metrics, and endorsements

Looking to achieve traction in your niche? Your Fintech Story provides strategic support to help fintech startups grow with focus and clarity. Get in touch to learn more.

Spanish banks BBVA and CaixaBank have completed Europe’s first interbank Request-to-Pay (RTP) transactions. In a live pilot during April and May 2025, the two banks – working with clearing house Iberpay – processed payee-initiated requests in a controlled test environment. Each request was instantly settled via SEPA instant transfer once approved by the payer, demonstrating seamless real-time execution.

The pilot, governed by the EPC’s SEPA RTP scheme and cleared by Iberpay, confirmed that instant rails can support RTP 24/7. With full interoperability and immediate settlement achieved, this marks a significant step toward digitising non‑recurring payments such as invoices and public charges across the SEPA region.

What is RTP?

In this context, “RTP” (Request-to-Pay) refers to a payment protocol built on real-time rails. Under the EPC’s SEPA RTP scheme, a payee (for example, a vendor or service provider) sends a digital request for payment to the payer (such as a customer or debtor). The payer can immediately authorize the request, at which point the payment is sent by instant transfer and becomes available to the payee instantly. This is fundamentally different from traditional SEPA Credit Transfers or one-off direct debits, which typically involve batch processing and slower clearing times. By contrast, RTP operates continuously (24/7) and combines the convenience of digital invoicing with the immediacy of instant payments.

• Payee-initiated workflow: Under RTP, the payment flow is inverted. The seller or service provider generates the payment request; the buyer then authorises it. This streamlines collections and gives the payer full control and confirmation. The funds move in real time as soon as approval is given .
  
  
• Instant settlement: Because RTP leverages SEPA’s instant-payment rails, transactions clear immediately.  Once approved, funds are received “ready to spend” in the recipient’s account. This eliminates the lag of traditional credit transfers (which can take hours or days) and is useful for time-sensitive B2B invoices or utility and tax payments.
  
  
• Standardisation (EPC scheme): The SEPA Request-to-Pay (SRTP) scheme, developed by the European Payments Council, provides a unified technical and legal framework for these requests across all euro‑area countries. It was explicitly designed to digitize processes like business invoicing and public-sector charges, potentially replacing less efficient methods (for example, single-use direct debits).
  
  
• Enhanced cash‑flow management: By modernising how payment requests work, RTP can speed up invoice payments and reduce reconciliation overhead.  Businesses no longer need to manually chase payments or wait for batch clearings; the request + approval model automates and accelerates the receivables cycle.
  
  

Key Takeaways for Fintech Startups

Here are five key insights fintech startup leaders should keep in mind as real-time payments move closer to mainstream adoption in Europe.

• Early Adopters Will Lead: Startups that integrate RTP early can gain a clear edge. Spain already leads in instant payments, and adoption is rising across Europe. Adding real-time pay-request flows to apps or platforms helps attract customers seeking speed and control.
  
  
• Embedded Payment Potential: RTP creates new embedded finance opportunities. Fintechs can build RTP into invoicing, ERP, or accounting software to offer clients seamless, on-platform payment experiences.
  
  
• Be Standards-Ready: RTP is built on SEPA and EPC frameworks. Startups should align with SEPA RTP and ISO 20022 standards early to ensure compliance and readiness for broader rollout under PSD2/PSD3.
  
  
• Innovate Around Use Cases: RTP unlocks models like instant bill pay, dynamic billing, and real-time financing. Fintechs in B2B, public services, or tax tech can build competitive features around these flows.
  
  
• Collaborate to Scale: The pilot shows incumbents are serious about RTP. Fintechs should seek collaboration with banks, PSPs, or clearing houses to accelerate adoption and gain industry credibility.

Want to explore how RTP could fit into your fintech strategy? Get in touch.

British fintech Revolut announced at President Macron’s Choose France investment summit that it will invest €1 billion in France over three years and apply for a French banking licence. The company plans to open a new Paris office for its Western European operations and create at least 200 new jobs in France as part of the investment. This builds on Revolut’s existing French presence – the firm already employs roughly 300 people in France – and comes after it secured a UK banking licence in mid‑2024, following a three‑year approval process.  Revolut also confirmed that its Lithuanian unit will remain a “key base” for its European growth. The Choose France summit itself is intended to attract major capital: President Macron said it is expected to bring more than €20 billion in foreign investment.

These announcements underscore France’s drive to draw in fintech investment under the Choose France initiative.  Macron’s summit at Versailles has been explicitly aimed at securing large-scale foreign investment, and Revolut’s expansion is seen as a coup for the French tech scene.  (For context, Macron noted that over €20 billion in new investment commitments are expected from the event .)

Recent Banking Licences for Revolut

Revolut has secured banking licences in several markets in recent years. Verified examples include:

• Recent Global Banking Licences for Revolut: Revolut has secured banking licences in several markets in recent years. Verified examples include:
• United Kingdom (July 2024): Revolut received a full UK banking licence (entering a “mobilisation” phase) after a three-year application process.
• Mexico (April 2024): Mexico’s National Banking and Securities Commission authorised Revolut as a multiple banking institution, granting it a full banking licence.
• Lithuania / European Union (December 2021): The European Central Bank approved a full EU banking licence for Revolut via its Lithuanian subsidiary.
• Belgium (2022–2025): Revolut operates in Belgium under its EU banking licence through a registered branch. In 2022, it began offering full banking services in Belgium, including deposit protection. In 2025, it introduced Belgian IBANs and started migrating accounts from Lithuanian to Belgian identifiers.

Each of these licences has allowed Revolut to broaden its services (deposits, loans, payments) in the respective market. The licence in Lithuania (via ECB approval) especially underpins Revolut’s EU-wide banking operations, even as it now pursues a French licence.

In May 2025, both Mastercard and Visa unveiled AI-driven shopping assistants, marking a new era of “agentic commerce.” Each network’s solution lets digital assistants research, recommend and pay for consumer purchases — without manual input. These services promise to let busy consumers delegate shopping tasks to trusted AI, but they take different approaches to security, control and integration.

This article focuses on the newest AI tools released by Visa and Mastercard related to agentic commerce, but we’ll cover other AI tools from these companies in one of the future articles.

Mastercard’s Agent Pay

Mastercard’s program, Agent Pay, is designed for conversational AI platforms. It uses what Mastercard calls “agentic tokens” to secure payments on behalf of users. These are merchant-specific, tightly scoped tokens — an evolution of Mastercard’s tokenization system — allowing AI agents to transact safely without exposing real card credentials.

Security is foundational to Agent Pay. Agents must be verified, transactions are traceable, and users can set granular permissions around what the AI can and can’t do. Mastercard also layers on biometric authentication, fraud monitoring, and dispute resolution. The platform is meant to be embedded directly into chatbots and voice assistants like Copilot or ChatGPT, enabling a seamless flow from recommendation to purchase.

“With the introduction of Mastercard Agent Pay, we’re effectively letting consumers and businesses close the loop. The user can receive recommendations, have tasks completed and make purchases — all in one place.”

– Sherri Haymond, Co-President of Global Partnerships at Mastercard

Visa’s Intelligent Commerce

Visa’s solution, Intelligent Commerce, is built for developers who want to plug AI platforms into Visa’s network. It introduces “AI-ready cards” — tokenized credentials that allow agents to act on behalf of a user without ever seeing the actual card number. These tokens are governed by real-time purchase limits and permissions defined by the user.

Visa’s architecture is more API-driven, designed to integrate broadly with the AI ecosystem. Partnerships with OpenAI, Microsoft, Anthropic, and Samsung suggest a strong push toward embedding payment capabilities into consumer and enterprise AI tools. Like Mastercard, Visa emphasizes user control and data protection, with a delegated authorization model ensuring AI agents act within strict parameters.

Two Different Visions for AI-Powered Payments

Although both Mastercard and Visa launched AI agent capabilities within days of each other, they’re not building the same thing. In fact, they reflect two distinct visions for how AI will interact with the payments ecosystem.

Mastercard’s Agent Pay is about building a seamless experience for end users who rely on AI assistants in their daily lives. It’s designed to fit naturally into conversational tools like Copilot or ChatGPT, enabling those assistants to go from recommendation to purchase — all under strict user-defined rules and secured by a robust tokenization layer. Think of it as giving your digital assistant a wallet and clear instructions on how to use it.

Visa’s Intelligent Commerce, on the other hand, is aimed squarely at the builders — developers and AI platforms that want to embed payment capabilities into their applications. It’s an infrastructure play, offering APIs and “AI-ready” credentials that authorized agents can use to make purchases within defined parameters. Rather than focusing on a specific user interface, Visa is providing the rails for AI-enabled commerce across a broad range of contexts.

So while both companies are enabling AI to transact, their approaches serve different use cases. One is tightly integrated into consumer-facing AI. The other offers flexibility for developers building entirely new AI-driven experiences.

Key Takeaways for Fintech Startup Founders

Agentic commerce is gaining momentum, but Mastercard and Visa are approaching it from very different angles. For fintech startup founders, this divergence offers both strategic clarity and opportunity:

• Two Distinct Visions, Not Competitors: Mastercard is building for consumers through AI assistants like ChatGPT or Copilot. Visa is building for developers, offering infrastructure that powers AI-driven commerce in any app or context.
  
  
• Choose Your Integration Path: If your fintech product involves end-user AI interfaces, Mastercard’s Agent Pay model may be more relevant. If you’re creating tools, platforms, or APIs that enable other businesses or apps, Visa’s approach could align better.
  
  
• Trust, Tokens, and Control Are Non-Negotiable: Both solutions reinforce the importance of user control, tokenization, and agent verification — expectations your product will also need to meet if it plays in this space.
  
  
• This Isn’t Just About Payments: These systems enable AI to drive product discovery, decision-making, and fulfillment — compressing the entire user journey into a single intelligent flow.
  
  
• New Value Chains Will Emerge: Think beyond checkout. Agentic commerce creates new points of influence: personalized recommendations, spend orchestration, task automation. Each could be a startup opportunity.

If you’re building or scaling a fintech solution and wondering how technologies like agentic commerce could reshape your roadmap, we’d love to talk. At Your Fintech Story, we help startups navigate complex shifts in strategy, product, and go-to-market. Get in touch today and let’s write the next chapter of your fintech story together.

Mastercard and crypto-fintech MoonPay have announced a global partnership to make stablecoin spending as easy as using cash or cards. Under the deal, fintech companies and businesses can issue Mastercard-branded cards tied to users’ stablecoin wallets.  Cardholders will be able to spend their stablecoins at the point of sale, with transactions immediately converted into the local currency behind the scenes. This means a user paying with a stablecoin could shop at any of the 150 million+ merchants worldwide that accept Mastercard, even if those merchants never touch crypto directly. The new service is built on MoonPay’s recent acquisition of Iron, an API-driven stablecoin infrastructure platform. Iron’s technology lets crypto wallets behave like digital bank accounts – enabling fast, efficient cross-border transfers and on-chain payments that settle into fiat during checkout .

Who’s Who: MoonPay and Mastercard

Mastercard likely needs no introduction. It operates one of the most established global payments networks, now actively expanding into digital assets and blockchain-powered transactions.

MoonPay, on the other hand, is a fast-growing crypto payments company that helps users buy, sell, and use digital assets. It serves as an on/off ramp for exchanges, wallets, and apps, with integrations across over 500 platforms and a user base spanning more than 180 countries. This partnership builds on their existing collaboration and combines Mastercard’s payments scale with MoonPay’s infrastructure and reach in the crypto space.

How the Partnership Works

The core of the partnership is a new stablecoin-linked card for end users.  Fintechs and other issuers can now create Mastercard cards that connect directly to a customer’s stablecoin balance. When a cardholder taps or swipes, their stablecoins (for example USDC, Tether or other fiat-pegged tokens) are automatically converted into the merchant’s local currency .  The merchant simply receives a normal Mastercard payment, but the underlying funds came from the user’s cryptocurrency wallet. In practice, this bridges the crypto world and traditional commerce: any crypto wallet becomes a kind of digital bank account that can fund everyday purchases.

“Our acquisition of Iron and long-standing relationship with Mastercard allow us to power a new era of payments made with stablecoins at more than 150 million merchant locations worldwide.”
— Ivan Soto-Wright, CEO & Co-founder, MoonPay

The technology enabling this is MoonPay’s Iron platform.  MoonPay bought Iron (a Swiss startup) in March 2025 and is using its API-driven stablecoin infrastructure to power the new cards .  As one report notes, Iron’s system “enables crypto wallets to act like digital bank accounts” and supports “fast and efficient stablecoin transfers” for global payments and disbursements .  In other words, Iron handles the stablecoin rails and compliance behind the scenes, while Mastercard processes the payment in fiat.  This allows businesses and fintechs to issue stablecoin-backed cards without needing to build blockchain infrastructure themselves .

The partnership is truly global.  While we often talk about digital euro or USDC adoption, the Mastercard-MoonPay deal aims to work “across global markets” .  It even cites examples like shopping at a local market in Asia or a Latin American merchant paying a European supplier, showing how stablecoin transfers can flow between regions .  In short, wherever Mastercard is accepted, a user’s stablecoins can be spent there.

Implications for Payments and Fintech

For merchants, nothing changes—they’re paid in local currency and don’t handle crypto. But for consumers and businesses, stablecoins unlock new potential. A user in Europe can pay in the US or Japan instantly with on-chain digital dollars or euros. In high-fee remittance regions, companies can pay freelancers or contractors in stablecoins, which recipients can spend immediately—skipping banking delays and high costs. As one fintech analyst notes, stablecoins combine the reliability of traditional money with blockchain speed, making them ideal for cross-border payments.

Fintechs and neobanks benefit in several ways. Offering a stablecoin card attracts crypto-savvy users—MoonPay’s network alone connects to 500+ crypto platforms and over 100 million users. It also streamlines payouts, letting fintechs send funds globally as stablecoins, which convert to fiat at payment. This is faster and cheaper than traditional methods.

With Europe’s MiCA regulation setting clear rules, and consumer openness to digital payments, stablecoin adoption is rising. Kraken and Mastercard now let EU users spend crypto via debit cards. Backed by firms like Mastercard and MoonPay, European neobanks could soon offer crypto-backed spending accounts to a broader audience.

Stablecoins are digital assets that track the value of traditional currencies like the US dollar or euro. They’re built on blockchain, which means they move fast and work globally, without the volatility of typical cryptocurrencies. With the new Mastercard–MoonPay cards, users can spend these digital “dollars” or “euros” almost anywhere Mastercard is accepted. Behind the scenes, the stablecoins are instantly converted into local currency at checkout, so merchants just see a normal payment.

Key Takeaways for Fintech Startups

If you’re building in fintech, here are a few things this news should put on your radar:

• Consider issuing stablecoin-linked cards.  Tapping this partnership lets your customers spend crypto at 150M+ Mastercard merchants worldwide . It’s a way to attract crypto-savvy users and make their wallets more useful.
  
  
• Use Iron’s APIs to integrate quickly.  MoonPay’s Iron platform handles the blockchain side. Fintechs can plug into it (via MoonPay’s APIs) to settle payments without building complex crypto infrastructure .
  
  
• Leverage crypto for payouts.  Think beyond consumer cards. With stablecoin rails, you can send international payouts or payroll faster and cheaper. For example, pay a freelancer abroad in USDC and let them spend it locally through the card.
  
  
• Bridge crypto and fiat smoothly.  Customers like to spend crypto, but merchants expect fiat. These cards automatically convert tokens to currency at the POS , easing merchant acceptance. Fintechs can highlight this seamless experience.
  
  
• Stay on top of regulations.  Stablecoin rules (like Europe’s MiCA) are still emerging. Keep watch on compliance for digital assets to ensure your offering aligns with rules as they evolve.
  

At Your Fintech Story, we help founders turn emerging trends into practical strategy. Whether you’re exploring crypto-linked products, international payout flows, or new revenue streams, we can guide you from idea to execution. Let’s talk about how this shift fits into your story.

Klarna, the Swedish fintech giant known for buy-now-pay-later services, recently cut its workforce by about 40%—from 5,500 to roughly 3,400 employees. Much of this was through natural attrition and a hiring freeze initiated in 2023. Simultaneously, Klarna leaned into AI, launching a ChatGPT-powered support assistant in partnership with OpenAI. This bot now handles millions of conversations across 35+ languages and replaces the work of about 700 full-time agents, reducing average resolution time from 11 minutes to under 2.

Klarna even used an AI-generated avatar of CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski to present its Q3 2023 earnings, highlighting its deep commitment to automation. While the company hasn’t attributed a specific dollar figure to chatbot-driven profit, it reported an 11% reduction in operating expenses in Q1 2024 thanks in part to AI tools.

But in 2025, Klarna acknowledged the downside: relying exclusively on AI hurt service quality. The company resumed hiring support agents and piloted remote “gig” teams to reintroduce a human touch. Siemiatkowski admitted, “AI was cheaper, but output quality was lower,” signaling a shift toward hybrid service models.

“I am of the opinion that AI can already do all of the jobs that we, as humans, do.“

Sebastian Siemiatkowski, CEO of Klarna

Broader AI Staffing Trends

Klarna’s evolution mirrors a wider tech trend. Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke asked staff to prove why a task can’t be done with AI before hiring. Platforms like IBM WatsonX and Salesforce Einstein are automating support, while Zendesk offers AI chat tools to reduce load on human agents.

This reflects a dual trend: enthusiasm for AI efficiency, tempered by the recognition that roles like customer support or dev work may only be partially automatable. McKinsey estimates up to 30% of such tasks could be automated by 2030. Microsoft, Duolingo, and Cisco have all made AI-related layoffs, while also acknowledging limits.

Strategic Pause & IPO Timing

Klarna’s hiring freeze was part of a broader “strategic pause” to cut costs and double down on AI. Between 2023 and 2024, headcount dropped by 22–24%, largely via attrition. Rather than mass layoffs, Klarna bet on AI and internal upskilling.

Klarna filed for an IPO in March 2025 but postponed the offering due to broader market uncertainty, including geopolitical tensions and tariff risks. This decision came despite strong performance, including double-digit revenue growth in H1 2024. The delay underscores that while operational discipline and AI-driven efficiencies can strengthen fundamentals, timing an exit still depends heavily on external market conditions. Fintechs should remain flexible and align scaling efforts with investor sentiment.

Key Takeaways for Fintech Startups

The Klarna case offers timely lessons for fintech leaders navigating automation, staffing, and growth. These takeaways highlight how to harness AI effectively while maintaining service quality and strategic flexibility.

• Balance AI and Humanity: Klarna’s bot delivered big gains, but customers still value human support. Use AI to augment, not replace. Always offer human fallback.
  
  
• Adopt AI-First, With Oversight: Like Shopify, trial AI before hiring. But monitor quality—pivot quickly if performance drops.
  
  
• Use Attrition Strategically: A hiring freeze can create space for AI integration. But know when to rehire, especially in user-facing roles.
  
  
• Leverage Existing AI Tools: You don’t need custom builds. Tap into tools like ChatGPT, Salesforce, or Zendesk to get fast wins in support, reporting, and ops.
  
  
• Align Tech Growth with Market Timing: Klarna’s delayed IPO shows the importance of syncing operational efficiency with investor confidence. Stay lean, agile, and ready to adjust plans.
  
  

We help fintech teams turn insights like these into practical action. Whether you’re exploring AI tools, rethinking hiring plans, or preparing for growth, our focus is on helping you make clear, informed decisions that balance efficiency with customer experience. Get in touch to discuss how to scale sustainably and stay adaptable in a fast-changing market.

Running a fintech company means making fast decisions with limited visibility. That’s why tracking the right metrics each week matters more than ever.

These ten numbers give you a clear view of what’s working, what’s not, and where to focus. They’re not for show — they’re what smart CEOs use to stay in control and move fast.

Content:

• WAU – Weekly Active Users
• GPV – Gross Payment Volume
• MRR – Monthly Recurring Revenue
• Burn Rate
• Runway
• CAC – Customer Acquisition Cost
• LTV – Lifetime Value
• Gross Margin
• NPS – Net Promoter Score
• TTV – Time to Value
• Tips for fintech founders

WAU tracks how many unique users are actively engaging with your product in a seven-day period. Whether you’re running a consumer banking app, a trading platform, or a budgeting tool, WAU gives you a direct line of sight into product engagement and traction.

Which values should you aim for?
A WAU/MAU (monthly active users) ratio above 20% is generally considered a strong engagement benchmark. But the real value lies in consistency — you want to see week-over-week growth.

Why WAU matters
If your WAU is flat or declining, it’s a sign that users are either not getting value or not returning. Tracking it weekly helps you catch product or onboarding issues early — before they hit your revenue.

How to calculate WAU
Count the number of unique users who performed a meaningful action — such as logging in, transacting, or completing a key task — within the last 7 days.

GPV measures the total dollar value of all transactions processed on your platform. It’s essential for fintechs in payments, lending, or crypto — where the volume of money moving through your system is a key performance indicator.

Which values should you aim for?
Aim for steady, compounding growth. In the early stages, double-digit monthly growth is a healthy sign that users trust your platform for real transactions.

Why GPV matters
GPV shows both scale and trust. If users are moving significant sums through your platform, you’re solving a real problem. If volume drops unexpectedly, it could point to churn, outages, or a competitor pulling users away.

How to calculate GPV
Add up the value of all successfully completed transactions within a given time period. Be sure to exclude refunds, test payments, or failed transactions.

MRR is the total predictable revenue your company earns from subscriptions or contracts each month. For fintechs operating on SaaS or recurring billing models, this is your most important revenue anchor.

Which values should you aim for?
Early-stage fintechs should aim for 5–15% month-over-month MRR growth. Later-stage companies should focus on net new MRR — the absolute dollar growth, not just percentage gains.

Why MRR matters
MRR reflects revenue quality. Unlike one-time transactions, it gives you visibility into how much income you can count on, which helps with planning, hiring, and raising capital.

How to calculate MRR
Multiply the number of active paying users by the average revenue per user (ARPU). For annual contracts, divide by 12 to reflect monthly value.

Burn rate is the amount of cash your company is spending each month, net of any revenue. It’s a core financial health metric and one of the first things any CFO or investor will ask about.

Which values should you aim for?
There’s no universal number, but the goal is to balance growth with sustainability. A controlled burn with strong unit economics is far more attractive than a high burn chasing vanity growth.

Why burn rate matters
If you’re burning too fast, you’ll run out of cash — regardless of traction. If you’re burning too slowly, you may not be growing aggressively enough. Weekly tracking helps you stay proactive.

How to calculate burn rate
Subtract total monthly revenue from total monthly expenses. If expenses exceed revenue, the result is your net monthly burn.

Runway tells you how many months your business can operate at its current burn rate before running out of cash. It’s a critical planning metric for any startup managing capital cycles.

Which values should you aim for?
12 months of runway is the minimum. If fundraising conditions are uncertain, aim for 18–24 months to stay ahead of the curve.

Why runway matters
Runway is your strategic breathing room. It dictates how aggressively you can grow, when you need to fundraise, and how much leverage you have when you do.

How to calculate runway
Divide your current cash balance by your monthly net burn rate. For example, if you have $600,000 in the bank and burn $50,000 per month, you have 12 months of runway.

CAC tells you how much you’re spending to acquire each paying customer. It includes all marketing, sales, and related overhead tied to customer acquisition.

Which values should you aim for?
A healthy CAC is one-third or less of your customer’s lifetime value. The industry rule of thumb is an LTV:CAC ratio of at least 3:1.

Why CAC matters
If it costs more to acquire a customer than they’re worth, your growth isn’t sustainable. CAC also tells you whether your acquisition channels are performing efficiently.

How to calculate CAC
Divide your total acquisition spend over a given period by the number of new paying customers acquired in that same timeframe.

LTV estimates how much revenue you can expect to earn from a customer over the entire duration of their relationship with your business. It’s a key component in understanding the long-term value of your user base.

Which values should you aim for?
Your LTV should be at least 3x your CAC. If it’s lower, you’ll struggle to profitably scale.

Why LTV matters
High LTV means your customers are sticking around, spending more, and generating better returns. It also gives you room to be more competitive on acquisition.

How to calculate LTV
Multiply the average revenue per user (ARPU) by the average customer lifespan in months or years. For higher accuracy, factor in gross margin.

Gross margin tells you how much of your revenue remains after covering the direct costs of delivering your product or service. It’s a key signal of operating leverage.

Which values should you aim for?
Fintech SaaS companies typically aim for 60–70% gross margins. Best-in-class platforms reach 80% or higher.

Why gross margin matters
A high gross margin gives you more flexibility to invest in growth, product, and people. It also indicates pricing power and operational efficiency.

How to calculate gross margin
Gross Margin = (Revenue – Cost of Goods Sold) ÷ Revenue. Expressed as a percentage.

NPS is a simple but powerful measure of customer loyalty and satisfaction. It’s based on how likely your users are to recommend your product to others.

Which values should you aim for?
In fintech, an NPS of 50 or above is considered excellent. Scores above 70 are elite and typically associated with strong word-of-mouth growth.

Why NPS matters
NPS is a leading indicator of churn and referral potential. It helps you understand how customers really feel about your experience — and whether they’ll advocate for you.

How to calculate NPS
Ask customers to rate their likelihood to recommend your product on a scale of 0–10. Subtract the percentage of detractors (0–6) from the percentage of promoters (9–10).

Time to Value (TTV) measures how long it takes a new user to experience their first meaningful outcome with your product. The shorter the TTV, the more likely they are to stay engaged.

Which values should you aim for?
You want TTV to be measured in days — not weeks. The faster you deliver value, the higher your activation and retention rates will be.

Why TTV matters
First impressions matter. If users don’t see value quickly, they churn. TTV gives you a clear target for onboarding, UX, and customer education improvements.

How to calculate TTV
Track the time from user sign-up to a key success milestone — such as their first transaction, approval, or completed action that signals value delivery.

A few tips for fintech founders

Tracking the right metrics is just the start; how you act on them matters just as much. Here are a few principles to keep in mind as you scale:

• Review your key metrics every week — not just before board meetings.
  
  
• Focus on trends over snapshots. The direction of a number often matters more than its size.
  
  
• Keep your dashboards simple. Prioritize clarity over complexity.
  
  
• Make sure your team understands what each metric means and how their work influences it.
  
  
• Don’t chase growth at any cost — sustainable growth with solid margins and retention is what builds real value.
  

Looking to sharpen your metrics or build a better growth strategy? Let’s talk. We help fintech teams translate data into direction.

Europe’s fintech scene shows that sharp execution and customer focus can still win, even in tough markets. The newest unicorns didn’t chase hype; they solved real problems in overlooked areas, built trust, and formed smart partnerships.

Here’s how they did it — and what other founders can learn.

DataSnipper

Born inside the Excel spreadsheet, DataSnipper turned one of the most mundane parts of finance — audit documentation — into a frictionless experience. Their plug-in lets auditors extract and cross-check data from invoices, ledgers, and contracts in seconds, saving hours of manual effort. The genius wasn’t just in the product, but in how seamlessly it fit into existing workflows. By 2024, hundreds of thousands of auditors were using it globally, largely through word of mouth. They didn’t disrupt the audit process — they made it 10x easier, and that focus on usability drove explosive organic growth.

Established: 2017

Unicorn status achieved: 2024

What they did right: They built a product that solved a highly specific pain point inside a tool auditors already use daily — and let the users do the scaling.

Pennylane

Rather than compete with accountants, Pennylane turned them into power users. This Paris startup worked directly with accounting firms to digitise the finance operations of SMEs — from payments to invoicing and reconciliation — all in one place. With over 2,000 firms onboard, they accessed a distribution channel few others tapped into. It’s a classic example of building deep partnerships instead of broad marketing. By solving real daily problems and embedding into trusted advisor networks, Pennylane quietly scaled to unicorn status by early 2024.

Established: 2020

Unicorn status achieved: 2024

What they did right: They turned accountants into ambassadors, using existing relationships to scale fast and deepen their product stickiness.

Sygnum

When others raced to launch crypto exchanges, Sygnum chose a slower, smarter path — becoming a fully regulated digital asset bank. With licenses in Switzerland and Singapore, it catered to institutional investors who cared as much about compliance as innovation. As the crypto industry matured, that early bet on trust and infrastructure paid off. By 2025, with 2,000+ clients and booming tokenisation services, Sygnum crossed the billion-dollar mark. Their unicorn moment came not from hype, but from credibility, timing, and execution in an industry finally growing up.

Established: 2017

Unicorn status achieved: 2025

What they did right: They focused on building trust and compliance infrastructure before it was cool — and reaped the rewards as crypto moved into the mainstream.

PayFit

Payroll might not turn heads, but PayFit transformed it into a seamless, efficient, and human experience.They built an easy-to-use platform that let small businesses across Europe manage payroll, benefits, and compliance without drowning in paperwork. By focusing on a massive, underserved segment and offering true product simplicity, they became indispensable to HR teams. PayFit’s rise shows what’s possible when you address a boring pain point with elegance. By 2022, they were processing salaries for 150,000+ employees and had grown recurring revenue by nearly 70% in a year.

Established: 2015

Unicorn status achieved: 2022

What they did right: They nailed the user experience for a process every business needs but few enjoy — and scaled by keeping it intuitive and compliant across markets.

Spendesk

Every growing company faces the same question: how do we control spending without killing flexibility? Spendesk answered that with a beautifully bundled platform for employee expenses, invoice management, and budget tracking. Finance teams didn’t have to juggle six tools anymore. Spendesk offered one intuitive dashboard, giving CFOs visibility while empowering employees to spend responsibly. That clarity and completeness helped it become a core finance layer for scaling businesses, pushing it past unicorn status in 2022 — and keeping it sticky long after the funding round headlines faded.

Established: 2016

Unicorn status achieved: 2022

What they did right: They built a single platform that aligned the needs of finance teams and employees — then focused relentlessly on execution and usability.

Years to Unicorn: European Fintechs

This chart shows how many years it took European fintech startups to reach unicorn status after being founded — on average, it took about 6 years.

What Fintech Founders Can Take Away

What sets Europe’s fintech unicorns apart isn’t flashy tech or hype — it’s a relentless focus on solving real problems, earning user trust, and scaling through smart, strategic moves.

• Meet users where they already are. Whether it’s DataSnipper integrating with Excel or Pennylane working through accountants, success often means enhancing existing tools — not replacing them.
  
  
• Solve real operational pain. Unicorns like PayFit and Spendesk won not by reinventing finance, but by making complex tasks radically easier for non-experts.
  
  
• Build for trust. In highly regulated sectors, long-term wins go to those who invest early in compliance, like Sygnum did with its banking licenses.
  
  
• Leverage smart distribution. Partner networks can outperform direct marketing. Pennylane’s channel via accountants is a textbook example of this.
  
  
• Focus beats flash. None of these companies grew by chasing trends. They picked a pain point, executed relentlessly, and scaled with discipline.
  
  

For fintech leaders aiming to cross that billion-dollar line, the lesson is clear: success doesn’t come from disruption alone — it comes from knowing your user, building deep trust, and solving one hard problem better than anyone else.

Klarna, the Swedish fintech giant renowned for pioneering the Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) model, has recently paused its much-anticipated U.S. IPO plans. The decision, initially aiming for a valuation exceeding $15 billion, comes amidst escalating market volatility and geopolitical tensions, notably the U.S. trade disputes with Canada and Mexico. These developments have introduced significant uncertainty, prompting Klarna to reassess the timing of its public debut. 

Internally, Klarna has been undergoing substantial restructuring to streamline operations and enhance efficiency. The company has significantly reduced its workforce, leveraging artificial intelligence to automate various functions. This strategic shift aims to bolster profitability and position Klarna favorably for future market opportunities. 

Despite these challenges, Klarna’s financial performance has shown resilience. In 2024, the company reported a 24% increase in revenue, reaching $2.81 billion, and achieved a net profit of $21 million, a notable turnaround from a $244 million loss in the previous year. These figures underscore Klarna’s adaptability and potential for sustainable growth. 

Key Takeaways for Fintech Startups:

• Market Timing is Crucial: External factors, such as geopolitical tensions and market volatility, can significantly impact IPO plans. It’s essential to remain agile and responsive to such dynamics.
  
  
• Operational Efficiency Matters: Investing in technologies like AI can streamline operations, reduce costs, and improve profitability, making companies more attractive to investors.
  
  
• Transparent Communication: Clear and honest communication with stakeholders, especially during restructuring, is vital to maintain trust and morale.
  
  
• Diversify Offerings: Exploring new markets and services can open additional revenue streams and reduce reliance on a single business model.
  

Klarna’s experience serves as a valuable case study for fintech startups navigating the complexities of scaling operations and preparing for public offerings in an ever-evolving market landscape.

Want help navigating uncertain markets like Klarna? At Your Fintech Story, we support founders with strategy, positioning, and investor readiness, so you’re prepared when the timing is right. Let’s talk about your next move.