Pulse of Fintech H2 2025: Americas

After three straight years of decline, fintech investment in Americas rises in 2025

After reaching a record high of $161.9 billion in 2021, fintech investment in the Americas dropped for three straight years — to a low of $55.4 billion in 2024. In 2025, fintech investment saw a positive — if modest — turn, rising to $66.5 billion despite deal volume falling for a fourth-straight year.

H2’25 saw $27.4 billion in fintech investment, a significant drop from the $39.1 billion seen in H1’25. The timing of megadeals accounts for this uneven balance; H1’25 saw the five largest deals of 2025, led by the $7.7 billion take private of US-based Dun and Bradstreet by Clearlake Capital,¹ while the largest deals during H2’25 were a $2 billion VC raise by real world event predictions market Polymarket² and the $2 billion take private of MeridianLink by Centerbridge Partners,³ both in the US. During H2’25, the largest deals outside of the US included a $750 million VC raise by Mexico-based credit card firm Plata Card⁴, followed by a $536.1 million VC raise by Canada-based wealth management platform Wealthsimple.⁵

The US accounted for $56.6 billion in fintech investment during 2025 — up from $42.4 billion in 2024 despite a modest drop in deal volume from 2,085 to 1,977 year-over-year. H2’25 saw softer investment and deals volume than H1’25 — with $23.9 billion across 961 deals, compared to $32.7 billion across 1,016 deals — driven in part by the protracted US federal government shutdown. Elsewhere in the region, Brazil saw fintech investment more than double year-over-year — from $847.4 billion to $1.9 billion year-over year, while Canada saw VC investment fall from a record high of $9.9 billion in 2024 based on a handful of marquee deals to a more typical $2.4 billion in 2025.

Trends to watch for in H1’26

Increase consolidation across startups targeting the four pillars of stablecoin infrastructure — wallets and custodians, orchestration infrastructure, issuers, and networks.
Cautious movement among corporates and larger PE firms looking at the stablecoin and digital currency space, with many looking at partnership models.
Corporates continuing to make strategic tuck-ins, while PE firms increasingly look at larger scale plays, including more take privates.
Growing focus on convergence between financial services and areas like wellness — led in part by collaborations and partnerships between digital banks and non-financial players.
Productivity focused AI businesses gaining the most attention from investors as corporates look to get control over their data and drive efficiencies.
Small business space continues to attract a lot of attention from fintech investors, including in Latin America.
Growing number of fintech IPOs as mature startups look to exit.

Here in Canada, several of our digital challenger banks are in growth mode and succeeding. We’re seeing these digital challenger banks looking beyond basic vanilla products — to merge the notion of financial services with other priorities like health and wellness. It’s going to be an interesting space to watch.

Dubie Cunningham

Partner, Banking and Capital Markets

KPMG in Canada