A fintech wanting to be ‘Australia’s leading migrant bank’ has launched a $4 million placement

There are plenty of fintechs and plenty of small caps seeking money from Chinese consumers, but few companies that are both.

Novatti (ASX: NOV) is one of them. The ASX-listed small cap is a holding company for half a dozen fintech platforms.

One of these is chinapayments.com which allows Chinese people in Australia to pay Australian utilities bills through AliPay.

They receive fees on a per-transaction basis for payments through the platform. In December, the volume was around $200,000 a month but in January this rose to $460,000.

For those with loved ones back home, they can send money overseas through TransferBridge or MoniSend, or alternatively pay bills on their behalf.

Even if you just want to spoil yourself, Novatti have a solution for you. Flexepin allows online payments that are safer and more hassle-free than traditional payment methods, allowing you to pay with a unique PIN.

• Subscribe to our daily newsletter
• Join our small cap Facebook group
• Follow us on Facebook or Twitter 

Back to the capital markets

But despite these successes, Novatti is not content and has launched a $4 million placement.

The end goal? In the company’s own words, “to launch the leading migrant bank in Australia”.

Peter Cook, CEO of Novatti, said the company was doing the raising for “the right reasons – to support our financial transactions growth and to progress our bank licence application”.

It has applied to APRA for that restricted banking licence and expects the outcome next quarter.

Novatti told prospective investors:

“A banking license provides the ultimate legitimacy to offer financial services and engenders maximum trust from consumers. Non-bank financial service providers, although generally regulated through other licenses, do not hold the same consumer trust.

“Since Novatti has experience operating under an Australian Financial Services Licence and a remittance services registration, a bank license is a further step for the group to broaden its license profile.”

Novatti claims to deal with 100,000 customers in 3 million payments per day. They believe high growth can come from the 220,000 new migrants that come to Australia annually.

While the mission’s code name is “Project International”, Novatti will primarily focus on China and the Indian sub-continent.

Of course Novatti will continue its existing platforms and will continue signing agreements with merchants. Recent figures have been very solid at around 8-12 per quarter.