Welcome to this week’s edition – where infrastructure meets imagination.
In a world racing toward tokenized economies and AI-augmented finance, the real game-changers aren’t always the flashiest headlines. They’re the quiet builders: the teams solving the plumbing so the future can actually flow.
This week, we spotlight two such builders in Samarth’s sharp Deal Highlights – Tangible, making hardtech investable at scale, and Sphinx, turning compliance from cost center to intelligent ally.
We also bring you a must-read Q&A with Tony McLaughlin of Ubyx – the man with 30 years in TradFi now architecting the clearing layer for tokenized money. His vision (and Barclays’ vote of confidence) reminds us why infrastructure still wins.
Frank Schwab drops truth bombs in his latest piece on the most undervalued asset in banking: the “translators” who bridge silos and make innovation actually happen.
And in Funding Rounds, we round up the week’s most inspiring raises – from onchain credit to AI-native back offices, personalized travel portals for banks, and agentic platforms reshaping everything from tax to client servicing.
These are the stories shaping what’s next in finance. Pour a coffee, settle in – the future is being funded right now.
A Q&A with Ubyx’s Tony McLaughlin on Clearing Infrastructure for the Tokenized Money Era
In the shifting landscape where Traditional Finance (TradFi) and Web3 converge, few voices carry the weight of thirty years of institutional expertise. Enter Tony McLaughlin, a veteran of payments and treasury, who recognized a pivotal “uncanny feeling” following the 2024 US election: the world was ready for public blockchains, but the infrastructure to support them was missing.
At Ubyx Inc., McLaughlin is building the critical “clearing system” that the digital asset world desperately needs. Since their launch in early 2025, Ubyx has moved with lightning speed—securing seed funding, going live, and recently announcing a strategic investment from Barclays. They aren’t just participating in the tokenization trend; they are solving the “many-to-many” problem to ensure stablecoins and tokenized deposits achieve true cash equivalence. We sat down with Tony to discuss why every bank on the planet needs a multi-chain wallet and how Ubyx is bridging the gap between regulated finance and the future of money.
1- Tell us about yourself / your co-founder(s).
I worked in tradfi for 30 years entirely focused on payments, treasury, cash management and transactional FX. After the US election I realised that banks and fintechs around the world would start to move into the world of public blockchains, and that tokenized money was likely to take off. I had the uncanny feeling that things I had learned over decades would give unique insights into the future market structure of stablecoins and tokenized deposits.
Read more from the interview: Ubyx Inc. on Bridging TradFi and Tokenized Money
Deal Highlights
Tangible’s starting point is in making hardtech (e.g. energy, compute, robotics, defense etc.) “institutional credit-ready” earlier. The broader market is the asset-based lending market (projected $1.26 trillion by 2028), whereas the smaller slice version is venture debt, e.g. Finleyx but for capex-heavy, asset-backed hardtech. It will be interesting to see how they go from enabler / SaaS-only to a more sizeable player/ take rate.
Tangible secures $4.3m seed to scale hardtech debt…Despite renewed global interest in hardtech, companies in this space frequently face challenges securing scalable debt until they are considered sufficiently mature or “institutional-ready”. As a result, many earlier-stage firms rely heavily on equity to fund capital expenditure, increasing dilution and, in some cases, threatening long-term viability, it said. At the same time, stronger performers in the category are using capital intensity as a strategic lever for growth. Tangible was established to address this financing gap. Its AI-powered platform, combined with in-house finance expertise, standardises the data, documentation and ongoing reporting required by lenders. By doing so, it aims to reduce underwriting time and costs while allowing founders to manage structured debt facilities without building dedicated internal structured finance teams.
I like the headline on their website “Your last compliance hire” – first thought is they are competing in the world of 100s of AML vendors, RPA tools, AI startups, and BPO giants. However, this is more the agent layer that does the work of the humans (who do the exception handling from those tools with tons of false positives)! Their browser-native, no-integration approach can help ease traction, but still need to watch e.g. BPO players’ offerings in this space.
Sphinx secures $7.1m to expand global compliance agents…. Rather than requiring new dashboards or system integrations, its agents work within case management platforms, third-party portals, PDFs, email, and internal dashboards, replicating the tasks typically carried out by human compliance analysts.
The product is designed to review alerts, conduct AML and KYB checks, gather supporting research, draft requests for information (RFIs), and document decision-making. Each action is recorded in a regulator-ready audit trail intended to provide institutions with a complete and defensible record of compliance decisions. According to the company, Sphinx’s browser-native approach allows teams to deploy the product within days, without replacing existing systems.
This architecture has also enabled Sphinx to operate across multiple regions from launch, adapting to local regulatory requirements and internal workflows. Sphinx said its agents are already being used in production by banks, public companies, and fast-growing FinTechs.
Read on for more on the founders and investors in the news last week. If you are building or backing “what’s next in finance” and want to spread the word with our network of 20K+, reach out to Samarth Shekhar or Frank Schwab.
The most undervalued asset on a modern bank’s balance sheet is not its software. It is its “Translators”
by Frank Schwab
In the race to build the future of finance, I see many institutions making a fatal hiring mistake.
They build “Silos of Excellence.”
They hire the sharpest DeFi developers and put them in a room. They hire the most experienced compliance officers and put them in another room.
Then they wonder why the product roadmap stalls or why the regulator says “No.”
The reason is simple: These two groups are speaking different languages.
👔 The Banker: Speaks in “Credit Risk,” “KYC,” and “Basis Points.”
💻 The Engineer: Speaks in “Smart Contract Audits,” “Finality,” and “Latency.”
Funding Rounds
Birch Hill raises $2.5m for onchain lending
Birch Hill Holdings, an institutional digital asset infrastructure firm focused on onchain lending and tokenised asset markets, has closed a $2.5m pre-seed funding round co-led by ParaFi Capital and Castle Island Ventures to advance compliant access to blockchain-based credit.
The round drew backing from ParaFi Capital and Castle Island Ventures, with additional participation from Nascent, FalconX Ventures, Coin Operated Group, The Operating Group, JST Digital and Flowdesk, as well as industry executives including Ramin Kamfar, founder & CEO of Bluerock.
Birch Hill aims to provide fiduciaries with a compliant framework for generating income in blockchain-based credit markets. Its approach places risk management and governance at the forefront, leveraging institutional-grade risk modelling to support transparent and auditable participation.
https://fintech.global/2026/02/13/birch-hill-raises-2-5m-for-onchain-lending/
Porters raises €2.7m to build AI-native backoffice
Porters, a European startup specialising in AI-powered banking operations automation, has secured €2.7 million in pre-seed funding to transform how financial institutions handle mission-critical backoffice processes.
Earlybird led the round, with participation from Seedcamp and several fintech founders, including Qonto, Upvest, and Metaco.
By combining AI software with a vertical service offering, Porters says it will enable fintechs and banks to boost operational productivity without additional headcount. At launch, it will provide financial institutions with account seizure and insolvency management processes. The funding will support the development and scaling of additional backoffice services.
Porters promises to help banking teams to move faster on regulated, time-sensitive workflows. For example, with account seizures, clients can handle higher volumes of cases with consistent compliance, thereby reducing the risk of bank losses or regulatory fines.
https://www.finextra.com/newsarticle/47254/porters-raises-27m-to-build-ai-native-backoffice
American Express and Visa alumni raise $4 million for Rhythmic, which partners with brands to provide financial products for their customers
Even as stablecoins gain popularity, Aaron Marks and Joseph Hayes believe the technology is still primarily used by crypto natives and people in emerging markets. Now, the two former credit card execs have founded a startup called Rhythmic to bring stablecoins to the broader market. Rhythmic’s strategy revolves around partnering with consumer-facing companies to provide cash back, rewards programs, and other financial products for the brands’ customers.
Rhythmic announced on Thursday that it raised a $4 million seed round led by Dragonfly, with support from Mirana Ventures, The Fintech Fund, and other backers. Marks, the CEO of the company, did not disclose the company’s valuation in an interview with Fortune.
Tangible secures $4.3m seed to scale hardtech debt
Tangible, a FinTech platform enabling hardtech companies to access and manage debt financing, has raised $4.3m in a seed round led by Pale Blue Dot.
The round was led by Pale Blue Dot, with participation from MMC, Future Positive Capital, Unruly, SDAC, Prototype Capital and Aperture. The capital will support Tangible’s efforts to streamline and scale debt financing for hardtech businesses.
Hardtech businesses are increasingly central to major macroeconomic shifts, including the energy transition, compute buildout, transport and reindustrialisation, Tangible said.
Despite renewed global interest in hardtech, companies in this space frequently face challenges securing scalable debt until they are considered sufficiently mature or “institutional-ready”. As a result, many earlier-stage firms rely heavily on equity to fund capital expenditure, increasing dilution and, in some cases, threatening long-term viability, it said.
https://fintech.global/2026/02/16/tangible-secures-4-3m-seed-to-scale-hardtech-debt
Bracket closes $7M round to expand treasury intelligence platform
Bracket provides AI-enabled FX, treasury, and cash management tools for mid-market businesses, helping finance teams automate workflows, centralise bank data, and gain real-time visibility across their treasury operations.
London-based Bracket, an FX, treasury, and cash management platform for mid-market businesses, has raised $7 million in seed funding. The round was led by Macquarie Group’s Commodities and Global Markets business and Blackfinch Ventures, with participation from existing investor Failup Ventures.
Demand for modern treasury infrastructure has grown among mid-market companies, many of which continue to rely on spreadsheets and manual processes to manage FX exposure, cash visibility, and bank connectivity. These limitations have increased the need for more integrated and automated solutions.
https://tech.eu/2026/02/12/bracket-closes-7m-round-to-expand-treasury-intelligence-platform
Sphinx secures $7.1m to expand global compliance agents
Sphinx, a RegTech company developing browser-native compliance agents for financial institutions, has raised $7.1m in seed funding as it looks to scale its technology across banks and FinTechs.
The funding comes as financial institutions face rising regulatory demands and growing compliance workloads, making it increasingly difficult to manage anti-money laundering (AML), know your customer (KYC), and know your business (KYB) processes without expanding headcount or adding operational cost.
Founded by Alexandre Berkovic and Chrisjan Wüst, Sphinx builds compliance agents that operate directly inside the software tools already used by compliance teams. Rather than requiring new dashboards or system integrations, its agents work within case management platforms, third-party portals, PDFs, email, and internal dashboards, replicating the tasks typically carried out by human compliance analysts.
https://fintech.global/2026/02/17/sphinx-secures-7-1m-to-expand-global-compliance-agents
Odynn Raises $9.5M Seed Round to Disrupt Travel Portals with Personalized AI Infrastructure
The “AI Shopify for loyalty and travel” enables banks to launch personalized travel portals in weeks instead of years; early customers see 108% increase in visits and reach profitability in months
NEW YORK, Feb. 19, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Today Odynn, the AI-powered platform enabling banks and fintechs to launch personalized travel and loyalty programs, announced it has raised $9.5 million in seed funding led by Bonfire Ventures and co-led by Fiat Ventures. Odynn is transforming how financial institutions deliver travel experiences by enabling personalized, branded programs in weeks versus years, at a fraction of legacy costs.
For decades, banks and fintechs have tolerated a broken system of expensive, clunky travel portals that have cookie-cutter deployments due to inflexible infrastructure, yet they’re stuck paying millions.
Uptiq lands $25m Series B to expand AI fintech platform Qore
The company previously completed a $12 million funding round in October 2025.
Uptiq, a Texas-based AI fintech, has secured $25 million in Series B funding led by Curql, with additional participation from Broadridge, Green Visor Capital, Silverton Partners, Live Oak Ventures, First Capital, Epic Ventures, Tau Ventures, Evolution VC, and 645 Ventures.
Founded in 2022 by CEO Snehal Fulzele, Uptiq provides AI-driven solutions to over 140 financial institutions globally. The company’s AI-powered offerings include tools for commercial lending, banker co-pilots, onboarding, compliance, portfolio insights, underwriting, risk analysis, and more.
All the company’s solutions are built on Qore, its proprietary AI orchestration platform. Uptiq claims that Qore is the first agentic AI platform specifically designed for financial services, enabling institutions to build and launch financial AI agents without the need for coding.
https://www.fintechfutures.com/venture-capital-funding/uptiq-lands-25m-series-b-to-expand-qore
Onshore Raises $31M in Series B Funding
Onshore (formerly SPRX), a NYC-based provider of an AI-powered tax platform raised $31M in Series B funding.
The round was led by FPV Ventures, with participation from Vertex Ventures, ADP Ventures, Y Combinator, and Restive Ventures.
The round brought the total funding to $46M.
The company intends to use the funds to support expansion into additional U.S. tax and accounting domains.
Founded in 2020 by CEO Dominic Vitucci, Onshore is a provider of an AI-powered tax platform that combines structured data pipelines, proprietary machine learning models, and expert review layers to turn raw financial documentation, including payroll data, general ledgers, and technical project evidence, into fully audit-ready reports.
https://www.finsmes.com/2026/02/onshore-raises-31m-in-series-b-funding.html
Avantos Raises $35 Million to Power the Future of Client Servicing in Financial Services
Funding fuels platform expansion to help financial institutions modernize operations for the AI era, scale with increasing client complexity
NEW YORK–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Avantos, an artificial intelligence (“AI”)-native operating system built to reimagine how financial institutions onboard and service clients, today announced it has completed a $25 million Series A funding round led by preeminent technology and software investment firm Bessemer Venture Partners (“Bessemer”). The round also attracted new strategic investors, including The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America® (“Guardian”), SEI® and Vanguard. This capital builds on the company’s $10 million seed round, which closed in September 2024 and was led by MIT-affiliated E14 Fund. The seed round also included M13, Mercer Advisors and Blue Collective.
InsurTech firm ManageMy secures $45m to drive global growth
InsurTech firm ManageMy has secured $45m in new funding as it accelerates international expansion and steps up investment in artificial intelligence-driven capabilities.
The $45m raise includes $20m from a Series B round, which was jointly led by Ventura Capital and OCVC, the investment vehicle of Zilch co-founder Sean O’Connor, according to InsurTech Insights.
Additional funding came from BNF alongside a consortium of strategic investors linked to the insurance sector. The valuation at which the round was completed was not disclosed.
The company develops technology designed to help insurers sell, service, underwrite and manage insurance policies through a single platform. Its software aims to replace fragmented legacy systems with a unified solution that supports insurers and brokers across the full policy lifecycle. ManageMy operates globally and has an established presence in London, serving clients across multiple international markets.
https://fintech.global/2026/02/11/insurtech-firm-managemy-secures-45m-to-drive-global-growth/
Insurance AI Leader mea Platform Targets Industry Combined Ratios and Margins With a $50 Million Growth Equity Raise From SEP
HAMILTON, Bermuda–(BUSINESS WIRE)–mea Platform (“mea”), the AI-native insurance technology company, today announced a $50 million minority growth equity investment from SEP, a leading investor in enterprise technology companies.
Since formation in 2021, mea has consistently driven the market for AI applied to the insurance industry. Demand is accelerating for mea’s products that rapidly improve combined ratios and strengthen margins.
Intentionally bootstrapped to date, mea is now in its fourth consecutive year of profitable growth. The investment from SEP enables mea to accelerate product development and customer engagement as the company continues its expansion, announced last October, across all (re)insurance operations.
Novig Raises $75M Series B to Build a Trader-First Sports Prediction Market
NEW YORK, Feb. 18, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Fastest-growing sports trading platform applies for DCM license to be available in all 50 states
- Novig operates a commission-free, peer-to-peer exchange designed for sports traders, utilizing an order-book model to provide market-driven odds
- 10X growth in trading volume in 2025
- New funding accelerates product development: more markets, deeper liquidity, and advanced trading tools purpose-built for sports traders
Novig, the fastest growing sports trading platform in America, today announced the close of a $75 million Series B round led by Pantera Capital, with participation from Multicoin Capital, Makers Fund, Edge Equity, and existing investors Forerunner, Perceptive Ventures, and NFX. The round brings Novig’s total capital raised to more than $105 million.
Greenlite AI rebrands as Bretton AI, secures $75m Series B
The round, coming nearly a year after the company’s $15 million Series A, will drive more hiring, product development, and the expansion of its agentic AI platform for financial crime compliance.
US-based financial crime compliance firm Bretton AI has secured $75 million in a Series B funding round led by Californian VC Sapphire Ventures.
The round also drew backing from new investor TIAA Ventures as well as continued support from all of Bretton AI’s existing institutional investors, including Canvas Ventures, Greylock, Thomson Reuters Ventures, and Y Combinator.
The Series B financing, which also sees Sapphire Ventures partner Rajeev Dham join Bretton AI’s board of directors, follows the company’s $15 million Series A, raised less than a year ago.
Founded in 2023, Bretton AI offers an agentic AI platform designed to help financial institutions optimise financial crime compliance workflows. Its technology supports transaction analysis, KYC and KYB reviews, AML and sanctions investigations, and ongoing transaction monitoring.
Vestwell raises $385 million to power the future of saving
The Series E doubles Vestwell’s valuation as the company surpasses 2 million active savers, $50 billion in assets, and $200 million in annual recurring revenue
NEW YORK, Feb. 18, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Vestwell, the infrastructure platform powering America’s modern savings economy, has raised $385 million in Series E funding. The round was led by Blue Owl Capital and Sixth Street Growth, with participation from new and existing investors, including Neuberger Berman, SLW, Morgan Stanley, Franklin Templeton, TIAA Ventures, and HarbourVest. JPMorgan was placement agent and structuring agent for Vestwell in connection with the financing.
The financing doubles Vestwell’s valuation since its 2023 Series D and brings total capital raised to $660 million. Vestwell has surpassed $200 million in annual recurring revenue and continues to grow profitably. The financing reflects investor confidence in Vestwell’s role as the infrastructure layer for how Americans save.
M&A
Thomson Reuters Acquires Noetica
Thomson Reuters (TSX/Nasdaq: TRI), a Toronto, Ontario-based provider of content and technology solutions, acquired Noetica, Inc., a NYC-based developer of an AI-native platform for corporate transaction intelligence.
The amount of the deal was not disclosed.
With the deal, Thomson Reuters will extend its CoCounsel AI capabilities by integrating structured market intelligence and benchmarking tools directly into legal workflows. This will enable deal professionals to benchmark key deal terms during transaction negotiations, assist with legal drafting, and offer professional’s deeper transaction data analysis throughout the deal workflow.
As part of the acquisition, Noetica brings its AI talent – including AI scientists, PhDs, and legal and finance experts – further expanding Thomson Reuters vertical AI capabilities in transactional markets. Thomson Reuters Ventures – the company’s enterprise technology VC fund – was an early investor in Noetica’s Series A, supporting the expansion of its AI-native platform.
https://www.finsmes.com/2026/02/thomson-reuters-acquires-noetica.html
Model ML Acquires Captide
Model ML, a NYC-based AI workflow builder for financial services, acquired Captide, a London, UK-based provider of a financial data layer service that turns global corporate filings and disclosures into LLM-ready documents and data for AI agents.
The amount of the deal was not disclosed.
With the acquisition, Model ML will expand its offerings.
Founded in 2024 by Maurits Brinkman and Miquel Trafí Ruiz, Captide offers an API service that takes SEC filings, earnings calls and more and structures them in a way AI models can understand at scale.
Its platform already spans 2.5 million+ documents and supports 1 billion embeddings.
https://www.finsmes.com/2026/02/model-ml-acquires-captide.html
Rezolve Ai Acquires Reward For $230M
Rezolve Ai (NASDAQ:RZLV), a global facilitator of AI-driven commerce and payments infrastructure, has acquired Reward, a provider of customer engagement and commerce media, for $230 million.
The acquisition brings together Reward’s engagement, intelligence and activation capabilities with Rezolve Ai’s conversational commerce and agentic AI platform to accelerate innovation in AI-powered banking and commerce.
Gavin Dein, founder and deputy chairman of Reward, said,
“Reward is on a mission to make everyday spending more rewarding, returning more than $2.5 billion to customers to date. We’ve donated circa $20 million to charitable causes, and rewarded staff, past and present, with more than $30 million as shareholders. I’m immensely proud of what we’ve achieved at Reward and excited about what the team will continue to build as part of Rezolve Ai group.”
https://www.crowdfundinsider.com/2026/02/262072-rezolve-ai-acquires-reward-for-230m/
The road ahead is being paved – one bold build at a time.
Every conversation, every line of code, every funding round in this edition points to the same truth: finance isn’t being disrupted; it’s being re-architected by people who refuse to accept “that’s how it’s always been.”
Whether it’s clearing tokenized value at global scale, making hardtech debt-ready before it’s “institutional,” or deploying compliance agents that think like seasoned analysts – the builders are moving fast, and they’re winning institutional trust along the way.
Thank you for reading, for sharing, for building. If you’re shaping the next chapter of finance – as founder, investor, operator or curious mind – keep going. The infrastructure you’re creating today becomes the rails everyone rides tomorrow.
See you next week. Let’s keep the conversation going – drop us a note, share your take, or tell us who’s next on your radar.