OBSERVATIONS FROM THE FINTECH SNARK TANK Chime launched its IPO with a splash. Shares jumped as much as 59% above the $27 offering price—opening at $43 and closing near $37—marking a bold public debut for the US’s largest neobank. With a valuation hovering between $11.6 billion and $15 billion—well below its 2021 private peak of $25 billion—the surge raises the question: Will this trigger renewed investment in neobanks and fintech? Pro: A Strong Chime IPO Reignites Fintech Interest Chime’s IPO follows strong debuts from fintechs like Circle and eToro. PitchBook’s Rudy Yang framed Chime as “a strategic breakthrough—marking a return…

OBSERVATIONS FROM THE FINTECH SNARK TANK Chime launched its IPO with a splash. Shares jumped as much as 59% above the $27 offering price—opening at $43 and closing near $37—marking a bold public debut for the US’s largest neobank. With a valuation hovering between $11.6 billion and $15 billion—well below its 2021 private peak of $25 billion—the surge raises the question: Will this trigger renewed investment in neobanks and fintech? Pro: A Strong Chime IPO Reignites Fintech Interest Chime’s IPO follows strong debuts from fintechs like Circle and eToro. PitchBook’s Rudy Yang framed Chime as “a strategic breakthrough—marking a return…

The world is finally catching up to a simple fact: you cannot solve the ocean plastics crisis in the ocean alone. You need to solve it on land too. As we mark World Oceans Day and gather at the UN Ocean Conference next week, that truth has never been more urgent, or more investable. For years, the most visible focus on ocean plastics has centered on what happens after waste enters the water, from cleanup technologies to capture devices. These efforts play a valuable role in addressing the plastic already polluting our oceans. But the larger, investable opportunity lies upstream:…

The antidote to bad tech is good tech. That line comes from the new movie Mountainhead, the latest from Succession showrunner Jesse Armstrong. I’ve been thinking a lot about that statement since I heard Armstrong repeat it in a recent interview. Armstrong’s observation landed with me because I’ve been spending a lot of time lately worrying about technology’s impact on young people and how those effects will play out in business and society. Although I’ve worked in technology for my entire career, people will tell you I’m a salesperson, manager and leader at heart. I’m at my best when interacting…

For the fifth straight year, Forbes is partnering with market research firm Statista to rate insurance companies in the United States. But we need your input to do it. We want to hear about your experiences with your insurance provider—or a provider you’ve worked with in the past—to help us identify the top insurance companies in the U.S. in these five categories: homeowners, renters, auto, permanent life or term life. While prices on policies continue to rise each year, tell us how your insurance company measures up in such areas as cost, claims service, digital capabilities, customer interactions and company…

Wall Street’s top watchdog, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), faces a pivotal moment amid converging legislative and legal challenges that could potentially reshape the future regulatory landscape. The regulator notched a win on Monday, however, as the Supreme Court declined to hear a penny stock broker’s legal challenge to FINRA’s constitutionality. Until recently, adding pressure to FINRA’s current predicament was its legal battle with Utah-based brokerage Alpine Securities, which was fighting against an expulsion order imposed by the regulator and contended that FINRA’s disciplinary process is unconstitutional. In an investigation published in September 2024, Forbes delved into the contentious…

Prominent attorney David Boies and his firm Boies Schiller Flexner filed three lawsuits this week alleging that at least five companies handling payouts for class action settlements conspired to secretly pocket bank interest payments and award each other business outside the view of attorneys and judges. The suit says the scheme has resulted in lower class action payouts for consumers. The firm filed the suit against claims administration companies Angeion, Epiq and JND Legal Administration, three firms that were also the subject of a recent lawsuit accusing them of taking secret payments from fintech companies. The Boies suit also named…

Small businesses are the engine of the American economy. They are often the first to innovate, the fastest to adapt, and the most determined to persevere through change. In moments of uncertainty, they continue to move forward not because conditions are perfect, but because resilience is embedded in their DNA. According to BoeFly’s April 2025 Franchise Growth Confidence Index,72.7 percent of franchisors remain confident in achieving their 2025 growth goals. That level of confidence in nearly three out of four leaders is significant considering the broader economic narrative around inflation, tariffs and ongoing interest rate uncertainty. Additionally, 65.2 percent expect…

Hong Kong billionaire Richard Li’s insurer FWD Group announced Monday it has refiled an application to list on the Hong Kong stock exchange, as investors clamor for a piece of the city’s red-hot IPO market. FWD did not disclose the target size or timing of its upcoming offering. A representative for the company declined to comment. FWD’s latest application marks the Hong Kong-headquartered insurance company’s fourth attempt to list on its hometown bourse, and its fifth in total. It last filed an application in Hong Kong in March 2023, following applications in September 2022 and in February 2022. These applications…

In my last column, I talked about how innovation from the fintech sector has helped companies in financial services and other industries, and how companies can apply lessons from fintech to accelerate their own technology development efforts. Since then, markets have been upended by the announcement of a set of historic new tariffs that is creating an unprecedented modern world saga. Although most of those tariffs are now “on pause,” and may even be successfully negotiated, it appears that the world is moving away from the globalization model that has dominated international relations for the past 20+ years. I have…