While You Were Away: Wix Launches Financial Services, Booking.com's 6% Cashback Card, and More

Hi embedded finance friend

Finally, my newsletter is back in its usual style after a few weeks of summer mode. There were actually a few Embedded Finance announcements over the summer that I haven't covered yet, so it seems like I have enough material for the next few weeks.

Exclusive Embedded Lending Dinner → I am hosting an exclusive dinner on September 24th in London together with finmid. This dinner is during the e-Commerce Expo, and we target e-commerce professionals who are keen to learn more about Embedded Lending. Sounds interesting? Apply here (or share with your network).

Two Embedded Finance Jobs → Was one of the outcomes from your summer break to search for a new role? In that case, there are two interesting Embedded Finance roles in my network: A German vertical SaaS is looking for its first Embedded Finance Product Manager (ping me!), and DWS is hiring a Digital Product Manager for its Embedded Investment Solutions (DWS).

Our Last Virtual Event → And last Friday, we hosted our virtual event about the five biggest mistakes when building Embedded Finance products. There were many interesting insights from our guest speaker, Christian von Hammel-Bonten, as well as from the audience. Perhaps we should put those into writing?

And now let’s dive in 👇

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Wix Follows Shopify Playbook with US Banking and Lending Launch

Wix launches a banking and financing product in the US (Wix). The Israel-headquartered company offers a website builder solution for companies and individuals worldwide. The comparison to Shopify may be evident, but Wix also caters to non-e-commerce websites. However, the launch of Wix Financial Services targets e-commerce shop owners in the US exclusively.

There are some additional similarities to Shopify, and they are not surprising: Both companies’ first step into Embedded Finance was their payment products. Shopify launched Shopify Pay in 2013, and Wix Payments was launched in 2020. Shopify followed with Shopify Capital, its financing product for e-commerce companies, in 2016 and Shopify Balance, its banking product, in 2020. Wix now launched both products, called Wix Checking and Wix Capital, in 2025.

Wix leverages the US infrastructure provider Unit for these two new product launches. Unit has been one of the first US banking-as-a-service providers that exclusively focuses on non-financial brands, specifically software and B2B SaaS companies (hence the term Embedded Banking provider). As covered before summer break, Unit extended its offering with a bill pay and financing solution. Wix's press release clearly mentions Unit as the provider for its banking product, Wix Checking. However, it is not entirely clear how Wix Capital is offered, but it is likely also leveraging Unit’s new financing offering, and Unit seems committed to growing this offering (LinkedIn).

In a way, the journey from payments to lending to banking seems like the proper prioritisation for Embedded Finance products for e-commerce technology companies:

Payments → Move relevant money flows into your software that were happening previously outside (big monetisation opportunity)

Lending → Remove one of the most significant growth barriers for your clients (increase sales on your platform)

Banking → Get your clients into your software for daily activities and use it to launch more adjacent products and features (strategic move)

Pleo Launches Money Market Fund Investment Feature in Germany

Pleo launches an investment account that enables its German business customers to invest spare funds into Money Market Funds, or MMF (Fintech Finance News).

If you wonder why this is Embedded Finance, because Pleo is clearly not a non-financial brand, I want to give you a high five because you are right. The news itself is not Embedded Finance. However, as a frequent reader, you are aware of two points: firstly, that Embedded Investment is the least developed of the five Embedded Finance products, and secondly, I am excited about the opportunity and its potential impact. And until we have a significant number of non-financial brands offering an Embedded Investment product, I hope you agree with me that it makes sense to discuss fintech companies, especially those like Pleo, which are not neobanks.

For a company like Pleo, in terms of size and feature offering, the launch of an investment product feels quite natural. It is the logical extension of their core product, helping their customers not just to spend and manage spending, but also to support adjacent financial features.

Pleo partners with German infrastructure provider Lemon Markets for the launch of this feature. Lemon Markets was recently acquired by Dwpbank (Finextra). Lemon Markets explained that larger potential clients often named Lemon Markets’ small size in the industry as one of the reasons they cannot work with them. Thus, the company is now operating as part of Dwpbank, and maybe that has already helped close the Pleo deal?

Booking.com Partners with Imprint for 6% Cashback US Credit Card

Booking.com launches a new credit card product in the US, offering up to 6% cash back for its loyal customers (Nerdwallet). The card is a Visa Signature Credit Card, issued by First Electronic Bank and launched in partnership with Imprint, a co-branded credit card provider.

Not surprisingly, the card is designed to increase spending on the Booking.com platform, as it allows new cardholders to earn $150 in travel credits after spending $1,500 within 90 days, as well as to receive an additional $100 in travel credits if they spend over $15,000 annually (on top of the cashback). Booking.com's loyalty program, called Genius Rewards, was launched in the US in 2013 and has since been a significant driver of its growth.

Cashback on card products in the US is a totally different ballgame than in Europe due to the higher interchange fees. When a European company offers cashback of more than 0.20% to 0.30% to consumers, it is typically cross-financed through other activities (e.g., the Trade Republic card, which offers 1% cashback through additional investments from consumers). That said, Booking.com's loyalty scheme is probably a great case study for other companies, and not just in the travel industry.

In other Embedded Finance news

• British neobank Starling is doing the “reverse Embedded Finance” and is interested in adding non-financial features, as it acquires digital tax and accounting tool provider Ember (Fintech Finance News).

• Neem, an Embedded Finance company from Pakistan, partners with fashion marketplace LAAM to power their platform payments (LinkedIn).

• CFPB to hold Synapse responsible for missing customer funds (American Banker).

• In case you don’t like my very own Embedded Finance primer (check the top of this email), have a look at Matt Brown’s Embedded Finance in 1,000 words (Matt Brown’s Notes).

• Embedded Finance Emerges as Growth Engine for Q2 Earnings (PYMNTS).

• What if Insurance Didn't Suck? Vertical SaaS is Showing the Way (YouTube).

Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoyed this edition.

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And if you need help understanding, building, or launching an embedded finance product, visit my website and get in touch with me.

Best wishes from Berlin,

Lars Markull (LinkedIn)