All posts tagged: Robinhood

Robinhood’s new Gold Card, BaaS challenges and the tiny startup that caught Stripe’s eye

Robinhood’s new Gold Card, BaaS challenges and the tiny startup that caught Stripe’s eye

Published by skeptic

Welcome to TechCrunch Fintech (formerly The Interchange)! This week, we’re looking at Robinhood’s new Gold Card, challenges in the BaaS space and how a tiny startup caught Stripe’s eye. To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important fintech stories delivered to your inbox every Sunday at 7:30 a.m. PT, subscribe here.  The big story Robinhood took the wraps off its new Gold Card last week to much fanfare. It has a long list of impressive features, including 3% cash back and the ability to invest that cash back via the company’s brokerage account. A user can also put that cash back into Robinhood’s savings account, which offers 5% APY.  We’re curious to see how this new card will impact the company’s bottom line. But also, we are fascinated by how Robinhood incorporated the technology it acquired when buying startup X1 last summer for $95 million and turned it into a potentially very lucrative new offering. Analysis of the week The banking-as-a-service (BaaS) space is facing challenges. BaaS startup Synctera recently conducted a restructuring …

Fisker loses customers’ money, Robinhood launches a credit card, and Google generates travel itineraries

Fisker loses customers’ money, Robinhood launches a credit card, and Google generates travel itineraries

Published by skeptic

Hey, folks, welcome to Week in Review (WiR), TechCrunch’s newsletter recapping the notable happenings in tech over the past few days. This week, TC’s auto reporter Sean O’Kane revealed how EV startup Fisker temporarily lost track of millions of dollars in customer payments as it scaled up deliveries, leading to an internal audit that started in December and took months to complete. Elsewhere, Lorenzo reported how Facebook snooped on users’ Snapchat traffic in a secret project known internally at Meta as “Project Ghostbusters.” According to court documents, the goal was to intercept and decrypt the network traffic between people using Snapchat’s app and its servers. And Manish wrote about the resignation of Stability AI founder and CEO Emad Mostaque late last week. Mostaque’s departure from Stability AI — the startup known for its popular image generation tool Stable Diffusion — comes amid an ongoing struggle for stability (pun intended) at the company, which was reportedly spending ~$8 million a month as of October 2023 with little revenue to show for it. Lots else happened. We …

Robinhood’s new credit card goes after Apple Card with ability to invest cash-back perks

Robinhood’s new credit card goes after Apple Card with ability to invest cash-back perks

Published by skeptic

Eight months after acquiring credit card startup X1 for $95 million, Robinhood announced today the launch of its new Gold Card, with a list of features that could even give Apple Card users envy. Robinhood, better known for its brokerage app aimed at the everyday investor, is touting all sorts of benefits with its new card in an attempt to attract users. The card has no annual or foreign transaction fees. However, it will only be available for Robinhood Gold members, which costs $5 a month, or $50 annually. (Gold is a program that offers other benefits like 5% APY on an account’s uninvested brokerage cash.)  Gold Card users can earn 3% cash back on all categories, including restaurants and groceries, and 5% cash bank when booking travel at Robinhood’s new travel portal. That cash back can be transferred to brokerage accounts, which can go toward making investments like stock purchases, the company says. The ability to invest using cash back is the big innovation that X1 developed prior to getting acquired. Another interesting feature …

PayPal Ventures’ first AI investment, a credit-based dating app and Robinhood’s good week

PayPal Ventures’ first AI investment, a credit-based dating app and Robinhood’s good week

Published by skeptic

Welcome to TechCrunch Fintech (formerly The Interchange)! This week, we’re looking at a new finance-based dating app, Robinhood’s earnings results and the startup in which PayPal Ventures made its first investment. Let’s dive in! To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important fintech stories delivered to your inbox every Sunday at 7:30 a.m. PT, subscribe here. The big story A new dating app was released just in time for Valentine’s Day, but there’s a catch: You must have at least a 675 credit score to use it. Launched by financial platform Neon Money Club, Score is a dating app for people with good to excellent credit, and it seeks to help raise awareness about the importance of finances in relationships. TC’s Dominic-Madori Davis gave us a look at what the startup aims to do and how it came about. Reading all the comments on X and LI was also quite entertaining! Analysis of the week Robinhood’s stock got a big boost last week when the company posted a surprise profit in the fourth quarter …

Robinhood settles Massachusetts regulators’ trading case for .5 million

Robinhood settles Massachusetts regulators’ trading case for $7.5 million

Published by Sam

BOSTON : Online brokerage Robinhood on Thursday agreed to pay a $7.5 million fine and overhaul its practices to resolve allegations by Massachusetts’ securities regulators that it encouraged inexperienced investors to place risky trades. Massachusetts Secretary of State Bill Galvin filed an enforcement action in 2020 alleging Robinhood’s app-based service used strategies that treated trading like a game to lure young, inexperienced customers into placing risky trades. Galvin, the state’s top securities regulator, said such “gamification” strategies including having confetti rain down for each trade made on Robinhood’s app. The settlement also addresses issues uncovered through another investigation by Galvin’s office into a 2021 data security breach and allegations Robinhood failed to maintain reasonable cybersecurity policies. Lucas Moskowitz, deputy general counsel and head of government affairs at Robinhood, said in a statement the deal “resolves historical matters dating back to 2021 that do not reflect Robinhood today.” “We are pleased to put this matter behind us and move forward steadfast in our commitment to providing access to the markets for our Massachusetts customers,” he said. …

Fintech’s biggest hits and misses of 2023

Fintech’s biggest hits and misses of 2023

Published by skeptic

As 2023 comes to a close, we’re here to look back at the biggest fintech stories of the year. Silicon Valley Bank’s implosion felt like a fintech story in that a number of startups (Brex, Arc and Mercury, for example) in the space leapt to fill the hole left by its collapse. But it truly was a story that affected all industries — and founders and investors alike. And one that continues to play out. Apple launches savings accounts for Apple Card customers Ironically, one of 2023’s biggest stories involved a tech giant and not a startup. In April, Apple shared that Apple Card customers in the U.S. could open a savings account and earn interest through an Apple savings account, as reported by Romain Dillet. At the time, Apple was offering a competitive APY of 4.15%. The company partnered with Goldman Sachs to offer the feature, but by year’s end, that partnership had fallen apart (an event we saw coming) and it was not yet clear who would be taking Goldman Sachs’ place. Mastercard …

Robinhood is on a quest to dive deeper into crypto

Robinhood is on a quest to dive deeper into crypto

Published by skeptic

It wants to attract the “entire spectrum” of digital asset investors Jacquelyn Melinek 8 hours Robinhood has been around for over a decade, and its foray into crypto isn’t necessarily new, but the company is still trying to expand its efforts there — even in groups that have typically strayed from the platform. “I think crypto has always been made by very technical people and for technical people,” Johann Kerbrat, the general manager of crypto at Robinhood, said on the Chain Reaction podcast. “At the end of the day, I think customers, when they use crypto, they don’t really care what is the protocol under it? What is the network that you’re using? They just want the thing to work.” While that may be true for novice crypto investors — the app has done a good job of onboarding that group by providing educational resources — but now it wants to focus on everyone, even those who do care about underlying protocols. Robinhood users can do more technical things like transfer to its crypto wallet …

Bitcoin continues climbing, Block releases hardware wallet, Robinhood expands to EU and VCs may see some relief soon

Bitcoin continues climbing, Block releases hardware wallet, Robinhood expands to EU and VCs may see some relief soon

Published by skeptic

Welcome back to Chain Reaction. To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important crypto stories delivered to your inbox every Thursday at 12 p.m. PT, subscribe here. It seems like there’s a pep in every crypto person’s step as bitcoin had another strong week, increasing over 15% to around $44,000, during a seven-day period, according to CoinMarketCap data. Ethereum, the second largest crypto by market capitalization, also increased over 15% during that time frame, to around $2,300. In general, the total crypto market cap steadily rose 14% from about $1.4 trillion to $1.6 trillion in the past week as more capital enters the crypto market. As bitcoin climbs, it also rejoined the top 10 club for the “top assets by market cap” globally. Bitcoin ranked in at number nine, trailing behind stocks like Nvidia, Amazon, Google, Saudi Aramco, Microsoft, Apple and precious metals like gold and silver, according to CompaniesMarketCap data. Bitcoin’s total market cap is currently about $854 billion, which accounts for over half of the total crypto market cap. What’s happening …

Following UK expansion, Robinhood brings crypto trading to EU

Following UK expansion, Robinhood brings crypto trading to EU

Published by skeptic

Robinhood’s long-awaited international expansion is at full throttle. The stock-trading app tailored to the younger generations is launching its crypto app to all eligible users in the European Union, the company said Thursday. The announcement comes on the heels of its foray into the U.K. just a week ago. While it’s taking crypto trading to EU customers, it’s only making its brokerage service available in the U.K. for now. The EU has been at the forefront of formulating regulations to enforce the traceability of crypto for anti-money laundering and protecting retailers from market volatility. Among the most important frameworks is the Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) rule, which focuses on stablecoin regulation and is seen as one of the world’s most comprehensive regimes for crypto assets. “The EU has developed one of the world’s most comprehensive policies for crypto asset regulation, which is why we chose the region to anchor Robinhood Crypto’s international expansion plans,” Johann Kerbrat, general manager of Robinhood Crypto, said in a statement. Aside from boasting low fees, Robinhood claims it’s the only …

Robinhood brings its stock-trading platform to the U.K., its first international market

Robinhood brings its stock-trading platform to the U.K., its first international market

Published by skeptic

We knew it was coming, but stock-trading platform Robinhood is finally open for business in the U.K. — its first international market since debuting in the U.S. more than a decade ago. Robinhood is granting early access to the app starting today for those who join the waitlist, with things gradually opening up to everyone across the U.K. some time in early 2024. The Menlo Park, California-based company began its U.K. launch prep nearly five years ago starting with a local hiring spree, eventually launching a waitlist for users in late 2019 before abruptly pulling the plug in mid-2020. The company never really gave a full explanation for the decision, merely noting that “a lot has changed these past few months” and that it wanted to focus on its U.S. business. In truth, the company was facing mounting pressure at home, including allegations that it was misleading customers and using cynical gamification strategies to entice inexperienced users to make risky trades. The company has also been hit with several multimillion-dollar fines over system outages and other …