A report by CB Insights has pegged investment into African fintechs (VC-backed) at $63 Million for the period of second quarter 2018. According to the report [PDF], this is a record investment when compared to the past four years.
"In Africa, VC-backed fintech companies in Q2’18 raised $63M across seven investments, more funding than the last four years combined," the report noted.
When compared with the previous year, investment into African fintechs this second quarter was up 133% as compared to the same quarter the year before [YOY].
Compared to all the other continents, Africa had the biggest jump in fintech investment the second quarter when compared to the first quarter (QOQ) in 2018. The continent had 99.6% QOQ jump in fintech investment. It was followed by North America with 48% QOQ jump and then Asia with 1.4%.
Europe and South America, on the other hand, suffered a dip in investment. With South America (-89%) having the biggest dip while Europe experienced a 20% dip in QOQ fintech investment.
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The huge jump could either be due to the fact that this is the first time CB Insights is including the African continent in its fintech reports. Or, it could be the methodology the company uses.
CB Insights doesn't include "grants, loans, or equity financings by the federal government, state agencies, or public-private partnerships to emerging startup companies." Yet these were the primary ways to fund startup across Africa initially.
Additionally, they do not include debt or loans as well as contingent funding. "If a company receives a commitment for $20M subject to hitting certain milestones but first gets $8M, only the $8M is included in our data," the report points out.
The report covered lending, crypto, regtech, personal finance, payments/billing, insurance, capital markets, wealth management, money transfer/remittances and mortgage/real estate.
Other revelations that the report found was that the quarter saw 5 new unicorns born. That is India's Policy Bazaar, Revolut in Europe and TradeShift, DataMinr, and Circle in the United States.
"Q2'18 saw five new unicorns births, bringing up the total VC-backed unicorn count to 29 worth a combined $84.4B," CB Insights noted.
When it comes to the VC firm with the most number of Unicorns in its corner, Ribbit Capital is leading the pack. "Ribbit Capital is the most active fintech unicorn investor, followed by QED Investors," CB Insights noted.
500 Startups, founded by Dave McClure, led in terms of deals into fintech startups between Q2'17 and Q2'18. It made over 13 investments in that period into fintechs like YayPay, WeTravel, First Circle and more.
It was followed by Ribbit Capital, CreditEase Fintech Investment Fund, NYCA and Omidyar Network - which also invested in Lidya.
Ant Financial's $14 Billion was the biggest deal in the quarter followed Dataminr's $392 Million and Robinhood's $363 Million.