Blueprint: $316MM raise for credit card platform Power; Opera browser integrations with MetaMask; Infura plans for decentralized protocol
Hi Fintech Futurists —
We were off yesterday given the great British Queue paying respect to the great British Queen. Hope you enjoy this combination of the Short Takes and Web3 news.
CREDIT: Fintech startup Power raises $316MM in funding (link here)
WEB3: Opera Crypto Browser Integrates MetaMask Ahead of Ethereum Merge (link here)
BLOCKCHAIN: Blockchain Tool Developer Infura Plans to Launch Decentralized Protocol (link here)
LONG TAKE: Fixing our innovation blindspots, with Apple identity and DALL-E AI art (link here)
PODCAST: Implications of the Ethereum Merge for Web3, with Justin Drake of The Ethereum Foundation (link here)
Web3 & Fintech Links
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Short Takes
CREDIT: Fintech startup Power raises $316MM in funding (link here)
New York-based fintech infrastructure firm Power is out of stealth with $16MM in seed funding and a $300MM credit facility. Power provides a full-stack credit card issuance platform designed for companies, brands, and banks, with embedded fintech experiences including custom credit card programs, personalised rewards, and targeted promotions. Who wants a Fintech Blueprint card, good people?
The tech stack has reportedly been built from scratch, independent from third-party apps for card management or applications. This includes templates to help launch cards quicker, and support for card design, marketing, loyalty, rewards and servicing the card. We don’t know performance to date, other than that thousands of cards were issued this year and tens of thousands are predicted to be issued next year. That said, there are a number of already-good companies that do this type of card issuance and “credit embedding”.
There have been several credit companies raising large rounds in the past few months. Two things to note. First, this investment follows the recent trend of preference for infrastructure over particular B2C bets — something we wrote about in a Long Take here. Helping others fight over Google and TikTok ads is maybe better than doing it yourself, if you don’t want to take a directional bet on fashion and culture. Second, it’s debt! Higher interest rates are going to lead to more credit spread businesses — a $300MM debt slug yielding 3-5%, or whatever the number is, from B2B underwriting is a nice revenue source for the capital provider.
Banks lending to pretend banks lending to non-banks.
WEB3: Opera Crypto Browser Integrates MetaMask Ahead of Ethereum Merge (link here)
Browsers! The killer use case of Web1.0 and the competitive window through which operating systems fought for the Internet. Opera, discussed herein, has a 1.3% share. Brave, the crypto privacy browser, is at about 20 million DAUs, but less than 1% share.
The news is that Opera is expanding its Web3 capabilities for its crypto-focused browser, launched in January 2022, that acts as a standalone product separate from their core browser. The browser integrated MetaMask in the lead up to the Merge last week, as Ethereum moved from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake. Note that MetaMask is the world's largest independent Web3 wallet with 30MM+ monthly active users. Opera bet that the Merge leads to an increase of crypto activity, and therefore an increase in users.
The Crypto Browser offers built-in support for dApps, a non-custodial wallet, and a dedicated news feed covering announcements, education, prices and metrics on gas fees and market sentiment. It supports Bitcoin, Ethereum, Polygon, Celo, BNB, FIO, Near, and Nervos blockchains and their respective native tokens. The latest feature is the Wallet Selector, an aggregator of wallet extensions within the browser that allows users to pre-set specific wallets for different websites. MetaMask, among other wallets, is directly integrated within the browser. DappRadar provides users with analytics for 11,000+ dApps across 48 protocols. PancakeSwap, the BSC yield-farming app, is also integrated into the native wallet. The browser also has built-in phishing detection that blocks blacklisted sites and adds a clipboard protection feature, with a malicious address checker coming soon.
Crypto-focused browsers are becoming increasingly mature, and are making it a more secure and seamless experience for users interacting with Web3. Opera’s offering may earn it market share against Brave, but we still wonder where Google, Apple, and Microsoft stand. What is the reason that these companies are not leaning into this particular platform shift? Perhaps the implied threat to their core business and regulatory overhang are sufficient.
BLOCKCHAIN: Blockchain Tool Developer Infura Plans to Launch Decentralized Protocol (link here)
Blockchain infrastructure provider Infura plans to launch an open source protocol that will support decentralized applications, an evolution of its current business model. The process involves decentralizing the provision of the JSON RPC API that users use to interact with the Ethereum blockchain, by enabling third party providers to run key software. We link to the early access program below.
Infura helps 400,000+ developers connect dApps to Ethereum without running a full node, managed via a private Vipnode pool, in which its nodes are peered with each other, and the pool acts as a coordinator server. The benefits of running a full node are that your interactions onchain are private, and if other nodes experience outages, your node remains unaffected. The downside is that it demands specialized technical knowledge, hardware for storage and memory, and higher cost.
Crypto Twitter and various developers have long wanted Infura to be decentralized, given it is a major underpinning of various protocols. For example, MetaMask can be rendered inaccessible to users where specific comprehensive sanctions programs are enacted by the US government. Similar issues abound with Alchemy, the Silicon Valley competitor to Infura. One potential outcome could be reminiscent of Pocket Network, an early but powerful experiment with decentralized infrastructure. We are excited to see how this plays out.
Long Take: Fixing our innovation blindspots, with Apple identity and DALL-E AI art (link here)
It is easy to fall into the trap of ignoring certain information, or expecting breakthroughs only from your favorite sources. After a while, we confirm too much of what we believe, and ignore too much of what we don’t understand.
In this take, we focus on our own blindspots around innovation from incumbents, and revisit developments from Apple in iOS 16 around BNPL and identity. We also check in on AI-based art, and reconnect to earlier themes around machine generated creativity.
Podcast conversation: Implications of the Ethereum Merge for Web3, with Justin Drake of The Ethereum Foundation (link here)
In this conversation, we chat with Justin Drake, Researcher at the Ethereum Foundation. He founded the Cambridge Bitcoin Meetup group in 2013, and in 2014 left his job as a programmer and FPGA engineer to study the blockchain space. In 2015 he operated a Bitcoin ATM and started a company providing a web interface for OpenBazaar. He is now a researcher for the Ethereum Foundation focusing on sharding.
He is also front and center of the biggest upcoming change to happen in Ethereum’s short history by transitioning from proof of work to proof of stake, commonly known as The Merge.
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