Some practical ideas for investors, in a fintech vein today: two savings products and a VC raising money well worth investigating!

First off if you happen to be a Moneybox shareholder – I bought some via their crowdfunding campaign – check this out. They’ve launched a  Reward Savings Account which “offers a competitive rate of 0.5% AER variable (powered by Cynergy Bank). You can access your money any time (withdrawals are limited to one per month) and save up to £10,000 into the account.️” Interest will be calculated daily and paid on the first day of the month with a limit of £10,000. You are also allowed withdrawal per month. Funds will be paid to your elected bank account used for all contributions and withdrawals the following business day.

More practically if you are not a Moneybox shareholder it might be worth checking out the Chip + 1 savings account which pays a rate of 1.25% (variable) on savings – they’ve just raised the amount you can save in this account from £5,000 to £10,000. In effect, there are two versions of this plan: a free version upto £2000 and a Chip AI version which charges £1.50 a month (£18 per annum) for amounts over £2000.  So, assuming you stick £10,000 in, you’d get £125 in interest per annum or £107 net of charges.

Sticking with this extra interest theme, its also worth noting that Freetrade runs a savings plan for their Plus customers. This Plus service costs £10 a month and gives you access to a much wider range of stocks and shares. But you also get a 3% interest rate on the first £3000 you have in the account. That translates into £90 a year in interest but you’ll still have to pay that £120 a year in Plus fees (which I’m happy to do).

Last but by no means least, if you are a Seedrs client have a look at their latest campaign today which is a fundraise for Passion Capital.

You can see it here – https://www.seedrs.com/passioncapital?utm_source=milestone_event_50&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=passioncapital

Passion is a first-tier UK venture capital firm with a good track record and normally mainstream private investors Wouldnt get a look into this kind of offer. It’s usually all institutional or ultra HNW capital. So, well done to Seedrs for allowing a way of mainstream investors access to their latest fund. I’ve put some money into the Seedrs offer. Exits to date have included Mendeley (Reed Elsevier), Readmill (Dropbox), Flattr (Ayeo/Adblock Plus), Zesty (Square), Picklive (Sports Millions), CarThrottle (Dennis Publishing). Here’s a bit more publicity bumpf about Passion:

Passion Capital is one of Europe’s leading VC funds, established in 2011 to bring founder-friendly venture investing to the UK and Europe. Founded by former entrepreneurs instead of traditional fund managers means that Passion was one of the first operator-led funds in Europe, as well as one of the first to have a female founding GP. Additionally, it was one of the first in London to not be based in Mayfair, but closer to entrepreneurs; reported to be the first in the world to publish and use a plain English language term sheet and not charge its portfolio companies any of its own legal fees; considered the first in Europe to publish fund infographics and to host joint office hours; and one of the first to manage a coworking office space where many of its portfolio companies were also based.

Over the last ten years the team has invested in some of the strongest European founders including those of GoCardless, Ravelin, Tide, Monzo, Lendable, Adzuna, Digital Shadows, Smarkets, Tray.io, Butternut Box, Marshmallow, and more.

What’s the money for?

We plan to make a further 15 or more investments (to end up with a total portfolio of 25-30 companies). We will continue to seek out exceptional founders building potentially category- and world-leading digital propositions in B2C (consumer) and B2B (SME/enterprise) markets.

We are sector-agnostic and believe that over time “digital” will no longer be a distinct sector, and therefore will look across all industries for compelling founders and entrepreneurs to back.

As just a few examples, we would expect to continue to capitalise on our strong fintech deal flow as we believe there is still a very large untapped market for “fintech for other fintechs” or for financial services institutions. We would also continue looking at digital health, and in particular reproductive health, and areas in which there has been historical under-investment. And of course we would continue to look at SME SaaS which has always been a strong area of interest for us.