🚀 Grab acquires Stash for $425M, MrBeast buys teen fintech Step, and Waymo raises $16B at $126B valuation. NatWest drops £2.7B on wealth management while Ripple secures EU EMI licence for European expansion.
Fintech industry moves
Singapore's Grab agrees to acquire Stash Financial for initial $425m
According to Reuters, tide-hailing company Grab is expanding its financial services portfolio with an acquisition deal for investing app Stash Financial. The agreement announced this week includes 100% of the equity interest in Stash and is expected to close in Q3 2026, subject to regulator approval. In a statement, Grab says it will first acquire a 50.1% equity interest in Stash for $425 million, to be paid in a combination of cash and stock. Following this, the company is looking to purchase the remaining interest at fair market value over three years post-closing.
Kirill Lazarev, CEO and Founder at Lazarev.agency: "Grab acquiring Stash shows super-app strategy moving into wealth. Grab already owns payments and lending in Southeast Asia, adding investing completes the financial services stack. Stash brings US market entry and retail investing infrastructure."
Ripple lands full EU EMI licence from Luxembourg's CSSF
US-based digital asset infrastructure provider Ripple has secured a full EU Electronic Money Institution (EMI) licence, enabling the company to expand its cross-border payments infrastructure across Europe. The licence has been granted by Luxembourg's Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier (CSSF). Ripple says it first landed preliminary authorisation for its EU licence last month and has since fulfilled all conditions required by the CSSF to obtain full approval.
Oleksandr Koshytskyi, Lead Designer at Lazarev.agency: "Ripple's EU EMI licence unlocks regulated cross-border payments across 27 member states with a single authorisation. Previously, Ripple needed country-by-country approvals, Luxembourg passporting eliminates this. The timing matters: MiCA regulation creates consistent crypto rules across the EU, making now the strategic moment to establish regulated infrastructure."
Rezolve AI buys customer engagement platform Reward for $230m
Nasdaq-listed fintech Rezolve AI acquired Reward for $230 million in cash. Reward works with banks and retailers to show card-linked cashback offers based on real, anonymised transaction data, and measures the spend that results. The UK-based company was created in 2001 and claims to have delivered $2.5 billion in customer rewards to date. Its existing partners include Mashreq, NatWest, Monzo, Virgin Money, and FAB, among others.
Danylo Dubrovsky, Senior UX/UI designer at Lazarev.agency: "Rezolve acquiring Reward combines AI commerce with transaction-linked loyalty. Card-linked offers are powerful because they close the loop between marketing spend and purchase behavior, and banks see actual transactions."
YouTuber MrBeast acquires financial services app Step
YouTube content creator MrBeast has entered the financial services market. His company, Beast Industries acquired Step, a money app offering credit building, saving, and investment tools to 7 million teens and young adults worldwide. Step was created in 2018 and is backed by celebrity angels Will Smith, Justin Timberlake, Charli D'Amelio, and basketball player Stephen Curry. In 2022, Step secured up to $300 million in debt funding led by Triplepoint Capital.
Kirill Lazarev, CEO and Founder at Lazarev.agency: "MrBeast acquiring Step is creator economy meeting fintech distribution. Step has 7 million teen users and solid financial infrastructure, MrBeast has 350 million YouTube subscribers, overwhelmingly Gen Z. The combination solves fintech's biggest challenge: customer acquisition cost. Traditional fintechs spend $50-200 per acquired customer through digital advertising. MrBeast can introduce Step to millions through content at marginal cost."
NatWest seals £2.7bn deal to acquire Evelyn Partners in wealth management push
NatWest Group acquired Evelyn Partners in a blockbuster deal valued at £2.7 billion. Evelyn Partners manages £69 billion in assets under management and administration. The firm's offerings include financial planning, discretionary investment management, and its online platform BestInvest. The acquisition includes Evelyn Partners' services and its network of 21 offices, 270 financial planners, and 325 investment managers.
Top 10 largest funding rounds of the week
Autonomous driving unicorn and robotaxi operator Waymo led the pack of the 10 largest funding rounds of the week, with $16 billion in fresh funding at a $126 billion valuation. Other large round recipients were overwhelmingly AI companies, with additional activity in aviation and space tech.
1. Waymo, $16B, autonomous driving
Waymo, the autonomous driving company spun out of Alphabet nearly 10 years ago, raised $16 billion in new funding at a $126 billion post-money valuation. Dragoneer Investment Group, DST Global and Sequoia Capital led the round. The Mountain View, California-based company says it plans to enter 20 more cities this year, including Tokyo and London.
Kirill Lazarev, CEO and Founder at Lazarev.agency: "Waymo's $16B raise at $126B valuation shows robotaxi has crossed from research to business. Expanding to 20 cities including Tokyo and London signals international roll-out confidence. The valuation milestone matters for product strategy: when Alphabet's patience capital transitions to institutional VC funding, unit economics become scrutinized."
2. Cerebras Systems, $1B, AI processors
Cerebras Systems, a developer of large, fast AI processors, closed a $1 billion Series H round led by Tiger Global, which set a post-money valuation of approximately $23 billion for the Sunnyvale, California-based company.
What this shows: Cerebras' valuation tripling from $8B to $23B in six months reflects AI infrastructure scarcity. Wafer-scale chip architecture delivers faster training speeds for specific model types. The Series H label, most companies IPO by Series D, signals Cerebras delayed public markets intentionally, building revenue base first. For enterprise AI buyers, Cerebras' funding validates multi-vendor chip strategy: when Nvidia GPU availability constrains roadmaps, alternatives with institutional backing provide credible supply diversity.
3. ElevenLabs, $500M, AI audio
New York-based ElevenLabs, a developer of AI audio technology, secured a $500 million Series D round led by Sequoia Capital. The round sets an $11 billion valuation for ElevenLabs, more than tripling from a year ago. The company also reported over $330 million in annual recurring revenue last year.
4. Skyryse, $300M, aviation
Skyryse, an aviation hardware and software company developing an operating system for flight as well as aircraft called the Skyryse One, landed over $300 million in Series C funding at a valuation over $1 billion. Autopilot Ventures and Fidelity led the financing for the 10-year-old, El Segundo, California-based company.
What this shows: Aviation software OS strategy mirrors mobile: own the operating layer, control the ecosystem. Skyryse's flight OS standardizes avionics across aircraft manufacturers, like Android for planes. If successful, every aircraft running Skyryse OS becomes a distribution channel. The $1B+ valuation reflects platform potential: OS companies command higher multiples than hardware because software scales without proportional cost increases.
5. Bedrock Robotics, $270M, construction robotics
Bedrock Robotics, a startup developing robotics technology for the construction industry, raised over $270 million in Series B funding. CapitalG and Valor Atreides AI Fund led the financing, reportedly setting a valuation around $1.75 billion for the roughly 2-year-old, San Francisco-based company.
Kirill Lazarev, CEO and Founder at Lazarev.agency: “Construction productivity has barely improved in 50 years, output per worker remains flat while costs rise. Autonomous machinery addresses dual constraints: labor shortages in skilled equipment operation and safety risks in hazardous site conditions. Investors value construction robotics highly because the TAM is massive ($10T+ global construction market) and incumbents lack technology capabilities."
6. CesiumAstro, $270M, space tech
Austin-based CesiumAstro, a provider of connectivity hardware and software for the space and defense industries, secured $270 million in Series C equity financing and $200 million in debt funding. Trousdale Ventures led the equity portion while Export-Import Bank of the United States and JP Morgan provided the debt.
7. Positron AI, $230M, AI infrastructure
Positron, a developer of energy-efficient AI inference hardware, picked up $230 million in Series B funding at a post-money valuation of more than $1 billion. Arena Private Wealth, Jump Trading and Unless co-led the financing for the Reno, Nevada-based company.
Oleksandr Koshytskyi, Lead Designer at Lazarev.agency: "Positron's energy-efficient inference hardware addresses AI's economics problem. Training costs billions once; inference runs billions of times daily. Every ChatGPT query, every API call, every real-time recommendation consumes inference compute. Efficiency gains in inference reduce operational costs proportionally, 10x efficiency improvement means 10x more queries at the same cost."
8. Fundamental, $225M, enterprise AI
Fundamental, a developer of AI models to build predictions from enterprise data, emerged from stealth and announced it raised a $225 million Series A led by Oak HC/FT. The San Francisco-based company, founded in 2024, also had a previously undisclosed $30 million seed round.
Danylo Dubrovsky, Senior UX/UI designer at Lazarev.agency: "Fundamental raising $225M Series A from stealth validates enterprise prediction markets. Large companies have data lakes full of operational data, sales transactions, supply chain events, customer behavior, but lack models that generate actionable predictions. Fundamental likely builds domain-specific models trained on enterprise data to forecast churn, demand, and risk. The stealth-to-$225M-Series-A pattern shows investor conviction based on early customer traction."
9. Tomorrow.io, $175M, weather technology
Boston-based Tomorrow.io, developer of an AI-native weather satellite constellation, closed on $175 million in equity financing led by Stonecourt Capital and HarbourVest. The company says it has fully deployed its first 13-satellite constellation.
What this shows: Proprietary weather data creates defensible AI advantages. Commercial weather data from Tomorrow.io's own satellites enables better forecasting than aggregated public data. Industries paying premium prices for accurate weather: aviation, agriculture, logistics, insurance, represent massive markets.
10. Goodfire, $150M, AI research lab
AI research lab Goodfire raised $150 million in Series B funding at a $1.25 billion valuation. B Capital led the financing for the San Francisco-based startup.
Kirill Lazarev, CEO and Founder at Lazarev.agency: "Goodfire reaching $1.25B valuation as a research lab shows AI interpretability has commercial urgency. Enterprise customers deploying AI in regulated industries: healthcare, finance, legal, face compliance requirements to explain AI decisions. Black-box models fail audits; interpretable models get approved. Goodfire likely works on mechanistic interpretability: understanding why models produce specific outputs."
Investing and stocks news
Siemens shares jump 7% as AI demand boosts profit outlook
According to the WSJ, European stocks were higher on Thursday as investors assessed another big batch of earnings reports. The pan-European Stoxx 600 was up 0.4% by 12:45 p.m. in London, with most sectors and major bourses in positive territory.
Oleksandr Koshytskyi, Lead Designer at Lazarev.agency: "Siemens jumping 7% on AI demand shows industrial automation benefiting from AI capital expenditure cycle. Siemens provides factory automation, grid infrastructure, and building systems – all required to build and power AI data centers. When hyperscalers spend hundreds of billions on AI infrastructure, Siemens captures a portion through electrical equipment, automation systems, and grid upgrades."
Best active ETFs to invest in
These active ETFs all earned the top Medalist Rating of Gold from Morningstar as of February 2026, spanning value, growth, and dividend strategies across market caps.
- Brandes US Value ETF (BUSA)
- Capital Group Conservative Equity ETF (CGCV)
- Capital Group Dividend Value ETF (CGDV)
- Dimensional US Small Cap ETF (DFAS)
- Dimensional US Targeted Value ETF (DFAT)
- MFS Active Value ETF (MFSV)
- Natixis Loomis Sayles Focused Growth (LSGR)
- Oakmark US Large Cap ETF (OAKM)
- Polen Focus Growth ETF (PCLG)
- T. Rowe Price Capital Appreciation Equity (TCAF)
- T. Rowe Price Dividend Growth ETF (TDVG)
What's coming next week
More mega-rounds as AI infrastructure capital deployment accelerates, more bank-fintech consolidation as incumbents buy rather than build, and another creator-economy crossover into financial services. And if you want to make your company a star of the fintech industry, consider working with Lazarev.agency as we provide:
- UX/UI design for AI & ML products
- Fintech product design with real-world constraints in mind
🔥 Stay sharp. Stay with Lazarev.agency, your AI design agency for fintech.
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