The fintech sector is undergoing a clear shift from hypergrowth at all costs to disciplined, sustainable expansion. Recent results from Q2 ’25 show that while global leaders like Visa and Global Payments are seeing expense growth outpace gross profit, firms such as Affirm and Toast prove that high growth can still be achieved with operating discipline. Net profit margins, capital efficiency, and leverage profiles vary widely across the peer set, underscoring the different strategies shaping...| Insight - 2023
Agentic commerce has shown a rapid uptick in interest recently. In this infographic, we pose a few strategic questions for the payments industry and map the broad ecosystem emerging to enable agentic commerce.| Insight - 2023
Europe’s local card schemes are stepping up their digital game. From enabling online payments and mobile wallets to embedding loyalty and cashback programs, domestic networks are closing the gap with global schemes. Merchants are finding more value in these schemes as costs rise elsewhere, while sovereignty and resilience remain key themes. Innovation, cost efficiency, and independence are driving a stronger role for local payment systems across Europe.| Insight - 2023
For years, scale dictated strategy: big banks managed credit cards in-house, while smaller players leaned on agent banks and program managers. With cloud-native platforms, modular stacks, and AI automation, these barriers are fading quickly. Issuers of any size can now rethink how they balance control, speed, and capital efficiency to find their own version of success in the credit card space.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
After a challenging quarter, the market is rebounding, with 9 of 14 tracked companies now posting positive 3-month returns. While growth continues, it has slowed modestly, suggesting a more measured expansion.| Insight - 2023
Earlier this year, we completed a survey of 100NA SaaS platforms on their embedded finance businesses. We are sharing key insights in a series of infographics. The third in this series focuses on embedded finance product advantages. Today 1. Current % of Company Profits Generated by Embedded Finance 2. Current Offering of Embedded Finance Products There is still significant embedded finance upside. Most respondents generate <41% of total gross profit from embedded finance. Leading platform...| Insight - 2023
Klarna, the Buy Now, Pay Later fintech, has officially revived its plans to go public. After pausing its IPO plans in April amid market volatility, the company has now filed for IPO on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker KLAR with plans to sell 34.3 million shares to raise $1.27B at a 14B valuation.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Every morning, small business owners open their laptops to a familiar headache. Their sales data lives in one system, their customer lists in another, and their marketing campaigns scattered across multiple platforms. To launch even the simplest promotion, they must stitch together emails, social ads, and reports from tools that don’t talk to each other. This complexity doesn’t stop SMBs from investing in marketing – like payments, marketing is not really an optional activity for busine...| Insight - 2023
In just two months, Ramp’s valuation jumped 40% from $16B to $22.5B, a testament to investor confidence in B2B fintech. Ramp’s journey from corporate card challenger to full-stack financial platform illustrates a broader trend: the convergence of spend management, treasury, payables, and embedded finance into unified operating systems.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Corpay agreed to acquire Alpha Group, a specialist in cross-border payments and FX, in a deal valued at $2.2–2.4 billion (£1.6–1.8 billion). The acquisition expands Corpay’s European presence while and reinforcing its position as a global leader in B2B payments. The acquisition is pending regulatory approvals and anticipated to close in Q4 2025.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Ten-plus years since the technology was first created, the question remains: Has SoftPOS truly arrived, or is it still awaiting its breakthrough?| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Flagship Advisory Partners recently sat down with Adyen Hemmo Bosscher for their latest 'Adyen Presents: Embedded Finance' podcast episode to discuss the latest developments and opportunities in the embedded payments.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Xero’s $3.1B acquisition of Melio marks a bold move as firms demand seamless, all-in-one platforms. Therefore, software providers are shifting to own the full financial workflow.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
AI is a well-established force of innovation in fraud prevention, the most mature application of AI in fintech. In Part 2 of our AI Impact on Payments and Fintech series, we cover the evolution of fraud prevention and AI's role in addressing this pressing market need.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
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B2B fintech and SaaS in Europe are still emerging relative to the more mature US market, with a fragmented ecosystem that continues to rely heavily on traditional bank transfers. At a co-hosted event with UBS, Flagship Advisory Partners delivered a presentation capturing he emerging innovation of B2B & Office of CFO SaaS in Europe, closely following the mature US fintech landscape.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
As fintechs scale, fragile workarounds for tracking customer funds often fail. Application ledgers provide a purpose-built solution for real-time, auditable transaction tracking. Now, Ledger-as-a-Service (LaaS) platforms make this capability accessible, emerging as a critical infrastructure layer enabling faster innovation across the fintech ecosystem.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
The SaaS sector is showing early signs of recovery: 9 out of 14 companies tracked have posted positive 3-month returns, a marked improvement from last quarter. Growth persists but at a decelerating pace, indicating emerging caution.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Flagship Advisory Partners insights- articles and resources.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Stablecoins are quietly becoming one of the most dynamic forces in global finance. In 2024, volumes hit $5.7T, with another 66% growth in Q1 2025 alone.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Software platforms are rapidly expanding into payments and embedded finance, capturing more and more of the fintech value chain. Our latest article explores how this trend, long underway in the U.S. is now accelerating across Europe.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Flagship summarizes what’s happening in payments and fintech and what we believe it means for the future.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
The issuer processing landscape is evolving rapidly, and success hinges on agility and informed decision-making. In this session, we highlight the trends, data, and strategies driving the future of card issuance. Whether you're scaling a fintech, integrating embedded finance, or leading transformation within a bank, this conversation offers practical, data-driven insights to help you navigate the next phase of growth.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Flagship has analyzed the B2B mobility sector activity levels using press releases of 39 companies from 7 different provider types.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Since its launch by the Brazilian Central Bank in 2020, Pix has been revolutionizing Brazil's payments landscape. Designed as an instant, account-to-account (A2A) transfer system, Pix is continually reducing dependence on traditional payment methods such as cash, boletos, and debit cards.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
The $2.2B acquisition of AvidXchange by TPG and Corpay is the latest example of consolidation in B2B fintech and, more specifically, AP Automation. We discuss the deal structure, recent performance of the companies, and deal implications on broader B2B fintech investment.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
The European office of CFO SaaS remains a fertile ground for investments and M&A. Rapid market consolidation across CFO SaaS domains, key regulatory mandates (e.g., B2B E-invoicing) and increased adoption of embedded fintech across SaaS domains makes the space an attractive investment hotbed.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Flagship analyses the competitive dynamics between local and global wallets in Europe, examining their respective market share performance, the drivers and barriers to their adoption, and the broader implications for key ecosystem players.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Our latest article explores why European SaaS (software as a service) platforms are excited about SoftPOS, a tap-to-pay innovation that transforms smartphones into contactless terminals, but are still slow to bring it to market. Despite SoftPOS’s promise to simplify tech stacks, cut hardware costs, and elevate in-person payment experiences, only 20% of leading SaaS platforms are actively promoting it today.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is all the buzz in 2025 and rightfully so. We cover the potential impact of AI on the payments and fintech industry in a multi-part series starting with Part 1, a general introduction to AI, outlining the historical context for AI’s impact on our industry.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Recent public market meltdown of North American B2B payments SaaS & fintechs likely to accelerate a wave of public-to-private M&A (along with other fintech domains). Market fundamentals, growth outlook and opportunity for value creation in the sector remain healthy for the long term.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
The European Payments Initiative (EPI) has introduced Wero, a Pan-European A2A wallet designed to unify and simplify EU payments for consumers and merchants.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
We observe that new client announcements from next-gen issuer processors are focused on fintechs and digital banks, whilst traditional processors remain centered on traditional banks.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
With trillions of dollars up-for-grabs, fintechs that seamlessly integrate into software platforms and enable effective (digital) collaboration between buyers and suppliers are best positioned to win. The Order-to-Cash (O2C) and Procure-to-Pay (P2P) cycles in B2B commerce are essential to financial health, but are still plagued by inefficiencies, manual processes, and payment delays.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
With trillions of dollars up-for-grabs, fintechs that seamlessly integrate into software platforms and enable effective (digital) collaboration between buyers and suppliers are best positioned to win. The Order-to-Cash (O2C) and Procure-to-Pay (P2P) cycles in B2B commerce are essential to financial health, but are still plagued by inefficiencies, manual processes, and payment delays.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Local debit schemes (CB, Girocard, Dankort, BankAxept, Bancomat) are on a decline in Europe due to lack of innovation, slow support of digital wallets, limited geo reach, and collaborative shortcomings.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
European regulators have focused on Apple for blocking third-party access to the NFC (‘Near Field Communication’) element in iOS devices| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
We summarize our most read insights of 2024.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Flagship has observed a surge of interest in the B2B mobility space over the past year, driven by several factors: the growing popularity of EVs, the introduction of Visa Fleet 2.0, the lack of product differentiation amongst traditional providers paving the way for new entrants, and the rising adoption of embedded payments in verticalized SaaS and fleet management software.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
The newest edition of The Payper's Global Overview of Payment Providers 2024 – Key Players and Trends in B2B/B2C Ecommerce. Read Flagship's introduction to the Evolving World of Payments.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
Visa and MasterCard recently announced a settlement with US merchants on interchange antitrust litigation. Read our review of the substance and implications of this settlement.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
We compare the growth evolution of registered North American and European (including the UK) payment facilitators (payfacs) from 2020 onwards.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com
The European office of CFO SaaS is a new battleground for embedded fintech. Leading SaaS platforms are increasingly embedding fintech solutions with software workflows and creating a winning formula of success.| insights.flagshipadvisorypartners.com