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💰 Funding
Residential Mortgage Investment Corporations (MICs) raise fresh cash:
Fintel Connect, an affiliate marketing platform that connects publishers with financial service providers, raised $1.5m from the province of BC.
StockPick, the Toronto based “Tiktok for retail investor news” received investment from BMO.
Landzer, a Montreal based real estate data platform to help buyers identify new development opportunities, raised $1.5m.
Local Logic and HonestDoor are other data insight platforms for real estate buyers.
Borderless, a Toronto HR platform for companies to hire and manage international employees raised $27m.
The company will have to compete with Deel, a US based rival and one of the fastest growing fintech companies in the world.
🤝 M&A
Constellation Software, the tech company rollup machine and Canada’s 13th most valuable publicly traded company is widening its investment criteria.
Constellation has acquired over 1,000 small businesses that are mostly founder owned & operated.
The company is now open to acquiring Canadian VC backed companies that have not lived up to their potential.
Montfort Capital, a Vancouver based holding company for private credit businesses acquired the remaining shares of Langhaus, an insurance policy lender for the high net worth.
They also own Brightpath (mortgages), Pivot (small business loans) & TIMIA (venture debt).
Wonderfi, the highly acquisitive crypto exchange is expanding into Australia by purchasing FX Institutions, a local competitor.
In the last two years they have acquired Bitvo, Bitbuy, Coinsquare & Coinsmart.
TPG, an alternative asset manager, is acquiring Canadian Apartment Properties REIT, a manufactured housing provider for $700m.
Nuvei, one of Canada’s largest home grown payment companies is considering going private. The company has languished in the public markets despite making several recent acquisitions and receiving investment from Ryan Renolds (that’s a good thing right?).
Read my full list of recent private equity buyouts of Canadian tech companies here to get a sense of how common this is becoming.
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🚀 Product
Delphia, was fined $300k by the SEC for making inaccurate claims about its use of AI. Delphia is a Toronto based investment advisor that raised $60m in 2022.
Though it’s a small fine, it’s pretty severe. The SEC is not saying that they think Delphia is using AI irresponsibly. They are saying that Delphia isn’t using AI at all!
Yield Exchange, a platform to browse and negotiate GICs across multiple financial institutions launched a rate shopping feature.
Institutional GICs is a super opaque market. Banks and brokers keep rates close to their chest. And even when they are posted, these rates will vary from the rate you may actually end up receiving.
This feature makes the market more transparent and competitive.
Ethical Insurance, launched in Ontario as Canada’s first shariah compliant provider of commercial property policies.
Fintechs Manzil, Eqraz and Wealthsimple have all also launched “halal” financial products across lending and investment.
⚖️ Policy
The House of Commons voted to pass the second reading of bill C-365, which mandates the government to advance towards open banking within 30 days. Next month we’ll see what that actually means when the federal budget is released.
OSFI has told lenders that they need to limit the number of mortgages that exceed 4.5x a borrower's annual income. This is on top of the federal stress test rules that require a borrower to be able to pay their mortgages if interest rates move 2% higher.
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Have a great week! See ya 👋