Tech

Tech roundup: Brazil’s fintech race for SME customers

Both digital players with a broad approach, such as Nubank, and those focused on serving entrepreneurs, such as Cora, see SMEs as the next frontier of Brazil's fintech revolution

fintech race for SME customers
Illustration: Andrii Yalanskyi/Shutterstock

Welcome to our Tech Roundup, where we bring you the biggest stories in technology and innovation in Brazil and Latin America. This week: The new frontier of Brazil’s fintech revolution is about winning business customers, not individuals.

The fintech race for SME customers

In the same week that Cora, a fintech founded in 2020 with a mission to serve entrepreneurs, reached 1 million customers, Nubank passed the mark of 3 million corporate clients in Brazil. Despite being two digital players, their approaches to what the industry sees as the next frontier of the fintech revolution in Brazil are slightly different.

Why it matters. Brazil has just over 21 million small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), including 14.5 million one-person businesses. They are the main target of digital banks and lending fintechs today, as they remain underserved by large banks — even more so at a moment of high interest rates and creeping default rates.

State of play. Between 2018 and 2022, the number of legal entities with a bank account increased from 11.4 million to 17.5 million — the largest jump on record (dating back to 2005). Also, a much more significant advance than the 18.9 percent increase in the number of individuals with bank accounts (188.3 million) in the same period.

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