KLYM is reportedly raising $27 million to expand its working capital offering in Latin America.
The Colombian FinTech, which was formerly known as OmniLatam, plans to use the new capital to expand in Brazil, Chile and Colombia and to start up in Mexico, Bloomberg reported Thursday (Jan. 19).
“Cross-border supply chain finance is a capability very few FinTechs have because it’s very expensive to build a bank in Europe or in the U.S. to do this,” KLYM Co-Founder and CEO Diego Caicedo told Bloomberg.
KLYM focuses on providing working capital to small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs). The company can finance suppliers in 32 jurisdictions, supports 25 currencies and offers receivables finance and other working capital after reviewing the prospective borrower’s invoices, tax forms and other data, according to the report.
Including its latest funding round, KLYM has secured $95 million in equity since its founding, and Caicedo plans to raise more this year, the report said.
The firm has a strategic alliance with JPMorgan that enables it to handle dollars, euros and other currencies and do trade finance.
It was reported in November that JPMorgan expects to continue growing its financial services offerings in Latin America due to the rising amount of investment and commerce that appears to be headed to the region.
Latin America is benefiting from the nearshoring trend of manufacturing moving to the region from China, increased financial flows headed there following the war in Ukraine and rising tension between the United States and China, Reuters reported in November.
Another firm seeing an opportunity to boost businesses’ access to trade finance in Latin America is Panama-based multinational bank Banco Latinoamericano de Comercio Exterior (Bladex).
In November, Bladex became the first bank in the region to join Dubai-headquartered Fintech Innovations International DMCC’s TradeAssets platform, which is an eMarketplace for financial institutions that helps banks in emerging markets gain access to trade finance and liquidity.
“With this collaboration we aim to grasp new business opportunities, while reducing the trade finance gap in Latin America,” TradeAssets Co-Founder and President Sumit K. Roy said at the time.