Industry WIKI

On February 14, 2025, Javier Milei, the president of Argentina, promoted a cryptocurrency project called $LIBRA. The price of the meme coin spiked following Milei's promotion but then suffered a severe price drop, leading to allegations of a rug pull scam and $251 million in losses for investors. This scandal has been dubbed Cryptogate. The Economist called it the "first big scandal" of

$Trump (stylized in all caps) is a meme coin cryptocurrency associated with United States president Donald Trump, hosted on the Solana blockchain. One billion coins were created; 800 million remain owned by two Trump-owned companies, after 200 million were publicly released in an initial coin offering (ICO) on January 17, 2025. Less than a day later, the aggregate market value of all coi

The Bitfinex cryptocurrency exchange was hacked in August 2016. 119,756 bitcoins, worth about US$72 million at the time, were stolen.

On 18 July, 2024, WazirX, an Indian cryptocurrency exchange, reported a cyberattack in which approximately US$234.9 million (around ₹2,000 crore) in digital assets were stolen from a multi-signature wallet used under a third-party custody arrangement with Liminal Custody. Global analysis later linked the attack to the Lazarus Group, a North Korea–associated threat actor targeting crypto

Accel (formerly known as the ACCEL/Exchange Network) is a North American interbank network owned by Fiserv. It connects over 412,000 automatic teller machines (ATMs) in all 50 states in the United States. The network also has a small number of ATMs in certain U.S. Air Force Bases around the world, and over 3.3 million electronic funds transfer at point-of-sale locations.

Affirm Holdings, Inc. is an American financial technology company and a point-of-sale lender. Founded in 2012 by PayPal co-founder Max Levchin, it is the largest U.S. based buy now, pay later (BNPL) financier. As of 2026, Affirm reports nearly 28 million users and processes $50 billion in annual payments.

Afterpay Limited (abbreviated as Afterpay) is an Australian technology company and a buy now, pay later (BNPL) lender. Founded in 2014 by Nick Molnar and Anthony Eisen, it is now owned by Block, Inc. As of 2023, Afterpay serves 24 million users, processes US$27.3 billion in annual payments, and ranks among the three most-used BNPL services globally.

Al-Barakat, or Al-Barakaat (Arabic: البركات), which means "Blessings" in Arabic, is a group of companies established in 1987 in Somalia. The firm is involved in the modern form of hawala, an informal value transfer system and remittance method. By 2001, Al-Barakat had outlets in 40 countries, and was the country's largest private employer. It handled about 140 million US$ a year from the

The Anglo Irish Bank hidden loans controversy (also known as the circular transactions controversy) began in Dublin in December 2008 when Seán FitzPatrick, the chairman of Anglo Irish Bank (the state's third-largest bank), admitted he had hidden a total of €87 million in loans from the bank, triggering a series of incidents which led to the eventual nationalisation of Anglo on 21 January

Banking in Egypt is regulated by the Central Bank of Egypt. Egypt’s banking sector has undergone major reforms since the 1990s, resulting in a liberalized and modernized system aligned with international standards. Financial inclusion has expanded, with 74.8% of Egyptians aged 15 and above using financial accounts, reaching 52 million users by 2024. Usage spans banks, Egypt Post, mobile

A basis point (often abbreviated as bp, often pronounced as "bip" or "beep") is one hundredth of 1 percentage point. Changes of interest rates are often stated in basis points. For example, if an existing interest rate of 10 percent is increased by 1 basis point, the new interest rate would be 10.01 percent.

Bath Clean Air Zone is an area of central Bath, England where traffic is restricted to reduce air pollution. It became the second Clean Air Zone in the UK (after London) when it was introduced in March 2021. It has been credited with helping to reduce nitrogen dioxide pollution in the city by around a quarter since 2019, and has raised over £7 million in fines. However, critics of the sc

Block, Inc. (formerly Square, Inc.) is an American technology company and financial services provider for consumers and merchants. Founded in 2009 by Jack Dorsey, it is the U.S. market leader in point-of-sale systems. As of 2024, Block has 57 million users and 4 million sellers, processing $241 billion in payments annually.

Cash App (formerly Square Cash) is a digital wallet for American consumers. Launched by Block, Inc., in 2013, it allows users to send, receive, and save money; access debit cards; invest in stocks and bitcoin; apply for personal loans; and file taxes. As of 2024, Cash App reports 57 million users and $283 billion in annual inflows.

The Central African CFA franc (French: franc CFA or simply franc; ISO code: XAF; abbreviation: F.CFA) is the currency used in six independent states in Central Africa: Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Chad, the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon. These six countries had a combined population of 55.2 million in 2020, and their total GDP exceeded US$100 billion (as o

CFA franc (French: franc CFA, [fʁɑ̃ seɛfɑ]) is the name of two currencies used by 227 million people (as of 2026) in fourteen African countries:

The Clearing House Automated Payment System (CHAPS) is a real-time gross settlement payment system used for sterling transactions in the United Kingdom. It is mainly used by financial institutions to make wholesale financial payments and by large companies to make corporate treasury payments. In 2024, 52.7 million CHAPS payments were made, worth a total of £87.5 trillion. This made up ju

Clinkle was an American startup founded in 2011, which sought to facilitate mobile payments with ultrasonic signals emitted by smartphones. The company's $25 million seed round in June 2013 was the largest in Silicon Valley history. Clinkle abandoned its ultrasonic technology due to insurmountable technical challenges and pivoted to launching a prepaid debit card service in 2014. The com

Coinbase Global, Inc. is an American cryptocurrency exchange. It was founded in 2012 by Brian Armstrong and Fred Ehrsam. Coinbase has over 100 million users, and is the largest U.S. based cryptocurrency exchange as well as the world's biggest bitcoin custodian, as of 2024. The company operates in more than 100 countries and holds nearly US$516 billion in assets, including nearly 12 perce

Crypto.com is a Singaporean cryptocurrency exchange company that offers various financial services, including an app, exchange, and noncustodial DeFi wallet, NFT marketplace, and direct payment service in cryptocurrency. As of June 2023, the company reportedly had 100 million customers and 4,000 employees.

Cryptopia was an international cryptocurrency exchange based in Christchurch, New Zealand. Founded in 2014 by Rob Dawson and Adam Clark, it was among the earliest cryptocurrency services started in the country, and was responsible for launching the first stablecoin pegged to the New Zealand dollar. Cryptopia experienced substantial growth in 2017 from 30,000 users to over 1.4 million by

E-gold or eGold was a digital gold currency operated by Gold & Silver Reserve Inc. (G&SR) that allowed users to make payments, which it called "spends", in grams of gold, silver, and other precious metals. E-gold was launched in 1996 and grew to five million accounts by 2009, when transfers were suspended due to legal issues. At its peak in 2006, e-gold processed more than US$2 billion w

EOS.IO is a blockchain protocol based on the cryptocurrency EOS. The smart contract platform claims to eliminate transaction fees and also conduct millions of transactions per second. It was developed by the private company Block.one and launched in 2017. The platform was later released as open-source software.

First Data Corporation was an American financial services company headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. The company's STAR Network provided nationwide domestic debit acceptance at more than 2 million retail POS, ATM, and at online outlets for nearly a third of all U.S. debit cards.

Flooz.com was a dot-com venture, now defunct, based in New York City that went online in February 1999. It was promoted by comic actress Whoopi Goldberg in a series of television advertisements. Started by iVillage co-founder Robert Levitan, the company attempted to establish a currency unique to Internet merchants, somewhat similar in concept to airline frequent flyer programs or grocer

GoodLeap, formerly Loanpal, is a U.S.-based financing company headquartered in Roseville, CA that provides financing options for residential solar energy and other sustainable home improvements. It has facilitated over $30 billion in loans to more than 1 million homeowners across 50 states as of 2025.

Henry Oberlander (born c. 1927) was the leader of the Hungarian Circle, a gang that defrauded international banks of hundreds of millions of pounds. Following a global investigation, the gang were arrested in 1978 at their headquarters in West London, England. During the trial, the prosecution asserted that the gang "could have wrecked the entire banking system of the Western World". Th

Israel Alexander Englander (born September 30, 1948) is an American billionaire hedge fund manager. In 1989, he founded his hedge fund, Millennium Management, with Ronald Shear. The fund was started with US$35 million, and as of July 2026 had US$92 billion in assets under management.

Jon Paul Ruggles (born November 28, 1973) is an American executive known for founding Monroe Energy and creating an internal trading house for Delta Air Lines that earned $420 million in trading profits in its first year. According to CNBC, Delta hired Ruggles as vice-president of fuel in 2011 to help right a fuel-hedge book that had been losing the airline money. He managed to generate

LevelUp was an American white-label platform for restaurants offering mobile ordering, QR-code payments and loyalty/CRM tools. It was created by Boston-based startup SCVNGR. Grubhub announced its acquisition of LevelUp for US$390 million in July 2018 and closed the deal on September 13, 2018. Post-acquisition, LevelUp’s technology was integrated into Grubhub’s restaurant-facing products,

Liberty Reserve was a Costa Rica-based centralized digital currency service that billed itself as the "oldest, safest and most popular payment processor, serving millions all around a world". Liberty Reserve was conceived as a "PayPal for the unbanked," allowing the 2.5 billion people without bank accounts or credit histories to participate in the modern economy. The site had over one mi

Litecoin (abbreviation: LTC) is a cryptocurrency and open-source software project created by Charlie Lee and released in 2011. Its software was derived from Bitcoin's codebase. Litecoin uses a scrypt-based proof-of-work system, targets a block interval of 2.5 minutes, and has a maximum supply of 84 million litecoins.

Lottery bonds are a type of government bond in which some randomly selected bonds within the issue are redeemed at a higher value than the face value of the bond. Lottery bonds have been issued by public authorities in Belgium, Ireland, Pakistan, Sweden, New Zealand, the UK and other nations.

Malone Lam Yu Xuan (born 19 July 2004) is a Singaporean man convicted for his connection to a cryptocurrency theft and money laundering scheme exceeding $260 million, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia.

Microcap stock fraud is a form of securities fraud involving stocks of "microcap" companies, generally defined in the United States as those with a market capitalization of under $250 million. Its prevalence has been estimated to run into the billions of dollars a year. Many microcap stocks are penny stocks, which the SEC defines as a security that trades at less than $5 per share, is no

MobilePay is a mobile payment application used in Denmark and Finland. The service allows payments by means of a smartphone application and was first introduced in 2013 by Danske Bank. It was introduced to Finland later in the same year and since 2017 it has been used by all banks in Denmark. As of 2022, MobilePay had more than 4.4 million users in Denmark (total population: 5.8 million)

Mt. Gox was a bitcoin exchange based in Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan. Launched in 2010, it was handling over 70% of all bitcoin transactions worldwide by early 2014, when it abruptly ceased operations amid revelations of its involvement in the loss/theft of hundreds of thousands of bitcoin, then worth hundreds of millions in US dollars.

The New Payments Platform (NPP), owned and operated by New Payments Platform Australia Ltd (NPPA) is a national industry-wide real-time payments platform for Australia. As of April 2025, there are over 25 million registered PayIDs.

The Pineapple Fund was a philanthropic project by an anonymous individual which gave away 5,057 bitcoins to 60 charities. The amount was valued at $86 million in December 2017. Some of the themes supported were medical research, environmental conservation, human rights and psychedelic therapy.

Quadriga Fintech Solutions was the owner and operator of QuadrigaCX. QuadrigaCX was believed to be Canada's largest cryptocurrency exchange at the time of its collapse in 2019, with the exchange ceasing operations and the company filing for bankruptcy with C$215.7 million in liabilities and about C$28 million in assets.

SafeCharge, was a Canadian payment service provider that provided payment services, fraud prevention solutions and connection to payment methods. In August 2019 SafeCharge was acquired by Nuvei, a privately owned electronic payment processing company, for the amount of US$889 million and was merged into Nuvei.

Shopify Inc. is a Canadian multinational e-commerce company headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario, that operates a cloud e-commerce management platform (CEMP) for retail point-of-sale systems. The company has over five million customers and processed US$292.3 billion in transactions in 2024, of which 57% was in the United States. Major customers include Tesla, LVMH, Nestlé, PepsiCo, AB InBev,

Silvergate Bank was a California bank founded in 1988. The company began providing services for cryptocurrency users in 2016, and conducted an IPO in 2019.

Speedpass was a keychain radio-frequency identification (RFID) device introduced in 1997 by Mobil (which merged with Exxon to become ExxonMobil in 1999) for electronic payment. It was originally developed by Verifone. By 2004, more than seven million people possessed Speedpass tags, which could be used at approximately 10,000 Exxon, Mobil and Esso gas stations worldwide.

Square is a point-of-sale system for sellers with physical or online stores. Launched in 2009 by Block, Inc. (formerly Square, Inc.), it enables merchants to accept card payments and manage business operations. As of 2024, Square is the U.S. market leader in point-of-sale systems, serving 4 million sellers and processing $228bn annually.

The American subprime mortgage crisis was a multinational financial crisis that occurred between 2007 and 2010, contributing to the 2008 financial crisis. It led to a severe economic recession, with millions becoming unemployed and many businesses going bankrupt. The U.S. government intervened with a series of measures to stabilize the financial system, including the Troubled Asset Relie

Sucden (Sucres et Denrées) is a French-based commodity broker of soft commodities and other financial products headquartered in Paris. The firm started as a sugar broker and is now amongst the world leaders with a market share of around 15% in volume (as of 2016), or 9.5 million tonnes. It has offices around the world, including London and Hong Kong.

Swish (Swedish pronunciation: [swɪʂː] or [svɪʂː]) is a mobile payment system in Sweden. The service was launched in 2012 by six large Swedish banks, in cooperation with Bankgirot and the Central Bank of Sweden. It had 8 million users as of July 2022 (total Swedish population: 10.2 million).

Tencent QQ (Chinese: 腾讯QQ), also known as QQ, is an instant messaging software service and web portal developed by the Chinese technology company Tencent. QQ offers services that provide online social games, music, shopping, microblogging, movies, and group and voice chat software. As of March 2023, there were 597 million monthly active QQ accounts.

Toshiba Corporation (株式会社東芝, Kabushikigaisha Tōshiba; English: ) is a Japanese multinational electronics company headquartered in Saiwai-ku, Kawasaki, Kanagawa Prefecture. Its diversified products and services include power, industrial and social infrastructure systems, elevators and escalators, electronic components, semiconductors, hard disk drives, printers, batteries, lighting, as w

Trading 212 is a European fintech brokerage group founded in Bulgaria in 2004 and headquartered in London, United Kingdom.

Ugly Americans: The True Story of the Ivy League Cowboys Who Raided the Asian Markets for Millions is a book by Ben Mezrich that recounts the exploits of an American called John Malcolm (a pseudonym) arbitraging index futures in Japan in the 1990s. The book was released on May 4, 2004 by William Morrow and Company.

In United States v. Banki, 685 F.3d 99 (2nd Cir. 2011) the Second Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the conviction of Mahmoud Reza Banki. Banki had been convicted of multiple crimes related to allegedly conspiring to violate United States sanctions against Iran by transferring large amounts of money — totaling some $3.4 million — from Iran to the United States.

Vipps is a Norwegian mobile payment application designed for smartphones originally developed by DNB. Vipps was released May 30, 2015 and, having reached 1 million users by November 5, 2015, Vipps became Norway's largest payment application. Although Vipps was developed by DNB, customers of any Norwegian bank can use it. Vipps is a member of the European Mobile Payment Systems Associatio

VugaPay is a cross-platform payment service owned by Vuga Ltd, a Rwandan company. It allows businesses and users to transfer money across major payment systems, including credit card networks, mobile money and Bitcoin via an application programming interface, unstructured supplementary service data interface, a mobile phone app, or a web interface. It processed over 5 million transaction

WebMoney is an online payment settlement system established in Russia in 1998. It is one of the largest electronic payments processors in Russia by number of users, with the company reporting 45 million registered accounts and 300,000 active weekly users in early 2020, and 100,000 stores accepting payments via the system. WebMoney is owned and operated by WM Transfer Ltd.

WeChat Pay (Chinese: 微信支付; pinyin: Wēixìn Zhīfù) is a mobile payment and digital wallet service by WeChat based in China that allows users to make mobile payments and online transactions. As of March 2016, WeChat Pay had over 300 million users. WeChat Pay reached 1.133 billion active users in 2023. WeChat Pay's main competitor in China and the market leader in online payments is Alibaba

WinCapita, previously WinClub and GiiClub, was a Finnish Internet-based Ponzi scheme that advertised itself as a private investment club engaged in currency trading. In reality, it was a bucket shop like many other foreign exchange fraud schemes. It operated mainly in Finland, with a smaller number of members also in Sweden. The operation collected about 100 million euros from more than

Yape (pronounced [ˈʝape]) is a digital wallet and mobile payment application developed by the Banco de Crédito del Perú (BCP) in 2016. As of 2025, it has over 20 million users. Its features include instant, commission-free peer-to-peer transfers, bill payments, and purchases using a smartphone via a phone number or QR code, without requiring a traditional bank account, enabling its use b

ZuluTrade is a Greek financial technology company that operates an online and mobile social and copy trading platform. The platform allows users to automatically copy the trades of other investors in the foreign exchange market. As of 2014 ZuluTrade had around one million users and an executed trading volume of over $800 billion.