Fintech adoption was increasing every two years before the epidemic, according to the Global Fintech Adoption Index 2019. The industry rose from 16 percent to 64 percent between 2015 and 2019. This expansion can be attributed to fintech’s increased adaptability when compared to traditional financial institutions. When the world was ravaged by the COVID-19 epidemic, businesses turned to fintech to help them escape the chaos.
What is Fintech?
Fintech refers to new technology that aims to improve and automate the delivery and usage of financial services. Fintech, at its most basic level, is used to help organizations, company owners, and individuals better manage their financial operations. They use specialized software and algorithms that run on computers and, increasingly, smartphones. The term “fintech” is a mix of “financial technology” and “financial innovation.”
List of Top Fintech in 2021:
1. PayPal
PayPal is the undisputed leader in online payments, but it is much more. For starters, its Venmo peer-to-peer payment tool has risen to the top of the industry. PayPal has also been purchasing related businesses. For instance, the e-commerce tool Honey, and forming partnerships that might significantly increase its target market.
PayPal currently has over 361 million active accounts, but CEO Dan Schulman predicts that number could rise to a billion. The COVID-19 pandemic may even aid PayPal’s expansion, as more individuals opt to shop online. Likewise, to send money to friends and family via electronic means.
2. Square
Square’s platform has grown from a mechanism for retailers to accept credit cards using their mobile phones. They have aimed to take it to a large-scale small-business and consumer financial ecosystem over the last several years. In addition to its core small-business clients, the company now handles card payments at a rate of over $100 billion annually. Square also has a booming small-business loan platform (Square Capital), and has begun to gain major headway with bigger merchants.
Square’s business is particularly fascinating in two areas. The first is its Cash App, which has shown a year-over-year increase in active users and has almost unlimited potential to expand its consumer financial service offerings. The second is Square Online Store, a new but fast expanding platform that assists Square’s merchants in establishing an omnichannel presence. It also allows for curbside pickup, which might be a significant growth driver in the post-COVID era.
3. Green Dot
Green Dot is one of the market’s oldest fintech firms, having invented the prepaid debit card two decades ago. The company’s debit-card business is still big, but it’s losing ground to startups like Square and PayPal, which are coming up with fresh and imaginative ways to solve the same problem. Green Dot, on the other hand, has begun to try to capitalize on its primary edge — its banking charter — by establishing savings accounts with a 2% interest for Walmart Money Card clients and selecting a highly experienced CEO to lead the bank’s banking initiatives.
Green Dot’s banking-as-a-service (BaaS) platform, which is used by firms like Apple, Uber, and Stash, and is still in the early stages of reaching its true potential, is also worth keeping an eye on. In a word, Green Dot allows businesses to offer financial services without needing to become banks (think of Apple Pay Cash). Green Dot effectively allows these businesses to use its financial infrastructure to power their products, and this might be a significant future growth industry.
4. MercadoLibre
MercadoLibre is often referred to as Latin America’s Amazon.com, and the moniker is well-deserved: the company has a sizable e-commerce industry that is rapidly expanding. From a fintech standpoint, though, the Mercado Pago payments platform is the most exciting. Every quarter, the company processes billions of dollars in payment volume, and it’s fast-expanding.
The fact that Mercado Pago is expanding quicker when it comes to processing payments outside of MercadoLibre’s e-commerce platform is very encouraging. Mercado Pago’s expansion could be just getting started thanks to a relationship with PayPal and plenty of room in the Latin American payments market.
