Daily Fintech Podcast - March 14th, 2022

Sign up for my Daily Fintech or Daily Digital Banking Newsletters here. Check out my latest podcast episode below: Hi! Welcome back to another episode of our Daily Fintech Podcast. This podcast episode is sponsored by Payhawk. Payhawk is the most efficient credit card backed by powerful financial software to help companies stay in control of their spend. Try efficient, paperless, compliant spending today. THE NEWS HIGHLIGHT OF THE DAY IS Rapyd reached a $15 billion valuation and becomes Israel’s highest-valued unicorn. The fintech company, which offers payment services across the world, has seen its value surge six-fold since January 2021. JUST IN: Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said it plans to close its operations in Russia, the first major Wall Street bank to leave in response to the nation’s invasion of Ukraine. ALSO: Sezzle is to cut 20% of its workforce following confirmation of a takeover by Australian rival Zip Co. FURTHERMORE, A £14 billion class-action lawsuit against Mastercard interchange fees has moved a step closer to trial with an additional £2.7 billion added to the claim following the latest judgment by the UK's Competition Appeal Tribunal. WHAT ABOUT CRYPTO? President Biden signed an executive order on Wednesday directing the federal government to come up with a plan to regulate cryptocurrencies, recognizing their popularity and potential to destabilize traditional finance. UkraineDAO, the decentralized autonomous organization created by Pussy Riot’s Nadya Tolokonnikova, Trippy Labs and PleasrDAO members, crowdfunded 2,188 Ether (ETH), or $6.1 million, for a Ukrainian flag NFT Bitpanda Payments has been authorized to conduct payment activities as an Electronic Money Institution (EMI) in Austria. Stripe already powers a pretty major swath of the web’s financial infrastructure, now its launching crypto payments support to give customers an easier path to onboard web3 users and interact with cryptocurrencies. On that note Stripe announced a partnership with FTX, one of the world’s leading crypto companies. Brazil's central bank (Banco Central do Brasil) has picked project proposals from nine firms - including Banco Santander, Visa, and Bitcoin Market - for a challenge investigating the development of a CBDC.