Another Strong Year of Fundraising for Boston FinTechs

There were at least 35 financing events resulting in more than $540 million in capital raised by Boston-area FinTech startups in 2019 — significantly more than any previous year except 2018 when Cambridge Mobile Telematics raised $500 million (all from Softbank) on its own. The average amount raised last year was more than $16 million.

I track roughly 140 active FinTech startup in Greater Boston which, by my definition, runs from Portland to Providence and as far west as Worcester. This means more than 20% brought in additional capital last year, a figure that has been steady for several years.

The largest funding event of the year was $250 million raised by Toast from TCV, Tiger Global Management, T. Rowe Price, and others at a $2.5 billion pre-money valuation. That’s on top of $115 million raised last year. Other notable rounds include $100 million raised by Hometap to give people another way to take advantage of the equity in their homes ($20 million was equity; $80 million went to a pooled investment fund), and $10.5 million raised by Digits, which hasn’t explained exactly what it’s up to, yet.

Four of the companies securing funding in 2019 are looking to address America’s student loan problem. They are FutureFuel, Stride Funding, LeverEdge, and QuatroMoney.

Here are the equity financing events I’ve tallied:

Toast	$250,000,000
Algorand	$ 60,000,000
MineralTree	$ 50,000,000
LendBuzz	$ 20,000,000
Hometap	$ 20,000,000
Numerated	$ 15,000,000
OpenExchange	$ 15,425,000
FutureFuel	$ 11,200,000
Digits	$ 10,500,000
OwnUp	$ 8,500,000
Centage	$ 8,500,000
Flipside Crypto	$ 7,100,000
Openly	$ 6,250,000
Coin Metrics	$ 6,000,000
Gradiant AI	$ 6,000,000
Fincura	$ 5,200,000
Catch	$ 5,100,000
Oneiro	$ 5,000,000
Indico Data Solutions	$ 4,100,000
MainVest	$ 3,500,000
Cambridge Blockchain	$ 3,500,000
Energetic Insurance	$ 2,900,000
Wallit	$ 2,600,000
Elisify	$ 2,500,000
LeverEdge	$ 2,425,000
Clearsurance	$ 2.400,000
Stride Funding	$ 2,139,000
Knox Financial	$ 1,400,000
Vested	$ 1,200,000
Digital Onboarding	$ 815,000
QuatroMoney	$ 575,000
Relativity6	$ 130,000
KingsCrowd	$ 70,000

Trio Financial and MackeyRMS also raised money in 2019 but the amounts could not be determined.

2019 also saw several exits. In April, Prattle Analytics was acquired by Liquidnet. In July, BlueTarp Financial was bought by CapOne, and Geezeo was purchased by Jack Henry. In all three cases, terms of the transactions were undisclosed.

I am certain to have missed some funding events and exits and to be unaware of some stealthy startups. My sources of data include, in order of authority: Edgar, reputable publications, CrunchBase, disreputable publications, rumor, speculation, and the Facebook affiliate known as Glavset. Please be in touch if you are aware of any startups, funding events, exits, or closures that I may have missed.

# # #