In the third quarter of 2022, European financial startups raised around EUR 3.2 billion. This is far below the same quarter last year but is still significantly more than in previous years. Layoff waves, burst financing rounds, and also several insolvencies – the mood in the fintech sector is particularly gloomy at the moment. Gone are the days when founders only had to include the word “fintech” in their pitch deck to be overrun by backers.
When a startup announces a funding round this summer, it sometimes causes surprise, including at Finance Forward. “Money is flowing after all,” it said then – contrary to the expectation that investors would keep their capital together. In contrast to the five billion euros in the same quarter last year, venture capitalists have invested only 3.2 billion euros in the past three months, according to a survey by French financier Blackfin Tech.
This means that the fintech scene can no longer match the record figures of 2021. Nevertheless, the total volume invested is far above every single quarter of the years before. If the digital industry had not exploded in 2021, the current funding figures would still be above the first Corona year.