Press

Fintech CUSO Nickels announces $4.0 million seed financing round

ANN ARBOR, MICHIGAN (October 12, 2022) — Nickels, a fintech company and CUSO that helps credit unions improve their members’ credit card health and unlock new revenue streams, announced the closing of $4.0 million in seed financing. This funding will be used to expand the company’s product capabilities, recruit top talent, and accelerate Nickels’ partnerships with credit unions. The round was led by Flyover Capital and Reseda Group, with participation from Detroit Venture
Partners and Michigan Rise.

Americans are charged more than $110 billion in interest and fees on their credit cards every year, and that number is only expected to grow. Inflation and the rising cost of living have caused consumers to take on more credit card debt than ever (averaging $8,942 per household, according to WalletHub), and rising interest rates are making that debt even costlier. Nickels will leverage this funding to expand its reach and increase its impact on improving Americans’ financial health.

In the age of digital banking, more consumers expect their financial institutions to support their financial health, but feel that few are meeting those expectations. “We see an opportunity for innovative financial institutions to stand out from their competition by applying technology to support their consumers’ financial health. We’re excited by Nickels’ opportunity to help community banks and credit unions continue to play an important role in people’s financial lives.” said Thad Langford, Managing Partner at Flyover Capital.

“We strive to help people achieve their financial goals by supporting promising FinTech companies in the financial wellness space through strategic investments and partnerships. Nickels’ mission closely aligns with our goals at Reseda, and we’re very excited about their initiative to help credit unions support members’ credit card health.” said Ben Maxim, CTO at Reseda Group.

“The US credit card market is incredibly consolidated with just 15 major banks controlling over 90% of the $850 billion+ market. Our solution helps the other 10,500+ financial institutions support their consumers with whatever credit cards they’re using. This improves an important aspect of their consumers’ financial health and creates opportunities for our banking clients to refinance their consumers’ credit card debt, which is a win-win for both the institution and their consumers.” said founder and CEO Joseph Gracia.

Nickels’ financial wellness solution empowers credit unions to help their consumers overcome credit card debt and build positive habits. It begins with an analysis of anonymized checking account data to identify refinance opportunities within the institutions’ existing consumer base, alongside a marketing toolkit that helps them connect with those consumers to refinance their third-party debt. Institutions then roll out Credit Card Coach, a white-label web application where consumers link in their third-party credit cards to receive personalized advice about managing payments, controlling spending, and improving credit scores. This third-party card data is fed
back to the institution to continually identify consumers who would benefit from refinancing their third-party credit card debt into the institutions’ own loan products.