Finance App Anyfin Raises $30M as Consumers Tighten Belts

Swedish loan refinancing app Anyfin is reportedly looking to expand after raising $30 million.

The funding will allow Anyfin to broaden its offering and expand to new parts of Europe, Financial Times-backed news site Sifted reported Wednesday (Jan. 18).

The Series C financing round comes as the cost-of-living crisis in Europe has consumers cutting back on spending and seeking new ways to manage their finances. Anyfin, based in Stockholm, raised $52 million in a Series B round in 2021.

PYMNTS has contacted Anyfin for comment but has not received a reply.

Founded in 2017 by Klarna vets Mikael Hussain, Sven Perkmann and Filip Polhem, Anyfin claims to give users better interest rates on loans and debt than other credit providers.

According to Sifted, the company does this by carrying out a deeper analysis of consumers’ risk profiles than what they’d glean from just using a credit rating. By looking at all consumer data, such as loan statements and credit card bills, it gets a more accurate picture than credit ratings.

As PYMNTS reported last year, Europe’s ongoing inflationary pressure has led many consumers there to cut back on spending. Much like their American counterparts, they’re facing soaring costs for food and fuel.

That has made it more important than ever for them to keep their finances in check, which has led to an increase in the number of personal financial management tools and budgeting apps designed to help struggling consumers track their spending.

Along with dedicated budgeting tools like Mint and YNAB, European neobanks have also begun debuting features to help customers understand their finances and keep within their budgets.

In an interview with PYMNTS, Ali Niknam, CEO of Dutch neobank Bunq, said the challenge modern consumers face is their electronic spending is harder to monitor than cash purchases.

“Digital money just doesn’t have the same feel to it as physical money,” Niknam said. “We’ve been trying to recreate that same type of experience digitally … we’ve always expanded on ways to make [money] more tangible and more intuitive.”

In a related story, PYMNTS reported Tuesday (Jan. 17) that ATM withdrawals were on the rise in the U.K. for the first time in 13 years. Building society Nationwide, which operates a network of over 1,200 ATMs in the country, says cash withdrawals rose by 19% in 2022 to 30.2 million as consumers resort to cash budgeting.

Another U.K. organization — the consumer group Which? — conducted a survey that showed 52% of respondents reported using cash as a payment method, saying it helps them track their spending. And 20% of people who don’t routinely use cash said that would change if England’s cost-of-living crisis worsened.

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