Nigerian FinTech Brokerage App Bamboo Notches $15M Series A

Brokerage app Bamboo raised $15 million in a Series A funding round that the Nigerian startup will use to escalate its growth while entering new markets and launching more products, according to multiple reports on Monday (Jan. 31).

The funding round was led by Greycroft and Tiger Global with participation from Motley Fool Ventures, Saison Capital, Chrysalis Capital and Y-Combinator’s Michael Seibel and others.

The investment platform enables people in Africa to buy and trade U.S. stocks in real time using local currency. Bamboo has more than 300,000 accounts in Nigeria, and its API can be integrated to enable asset managers, FinTechs and financial institutions to offer their customers global access.

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“Our goal is simple: we want to give Africans and their asset managers easy, fast and secure access to global investment options that will allow them to earn real returns. We’re building the technology infrastructure powering financial services in Africa such that if you’re investing in the global capital markets from Africa, you’ll be doing so using Bamboo, directly or indirectly,” Richmond Bassey, Bamboo’s CEO and co-founder, said in a statement.

“We also want to make it seamless for African investors in the diaspora to discover the best investing opportunities on the continent. We’re excited about our work with local regulators so far to make this a reality,” Bassey added.

Launched in January 2020 by Bassey and Yanmo Omorogbe, director of growth, Bamboo aims to open global markets for Africans.

Bamboo has over 50,000 people from Ghana on a waiting list after the startup announced in April 2021 that it was planning to launch there.

“Bamboo is enabling Africans to build wealth by creating an investing platform that is helpful to both experienced investors and to those new to the stock market,” Greycroft partner Alison Lange Engel said.