Italian online financial advisory service MoneyFarm raised 16 million euros in a new funding round from venture capital funds, which is a figure that is really not usual for an italian startup to raise (download here the press release).
The round was led by the British venture capital firm Cabot Square Capital who was joined by Italy’s United Ventures. The latter was already a Moneyfarm’s shareholder owning a 35.35 % stake after Principia sgr, another venture capital firm, divested its 28% stake last April.
After the new funding round Cabot Square and United ventures control about one third of Moneyfarm’s shareholders capital while the rest is owned by the management and a group o private investors.
Founded by chairman Paolo Galvani and ceo Giovanni Daprà in February 2011, the company is specialized iin building and managing portfolios in ETFs for retail investors and it is one of the few Italian fintech companies having venture capital operators among its shareholders.
Moneyfarm has been looking for a new foreign investor since July 2014. At that time Mr. Galvani said MF Milano Finanza that ” we might choose to enlarge our activity abroad. In Italy you cannot find venture capital funds able to invest 5 million euros or more in a single deal so it is necessay to look for foreign investors” (see here a previous post by BeBeez).
