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October 6, 2022

QED named to Inc.’s 2022 list of founder-friendly investors

By

Ashley Marshall

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ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- Inc. today announced QED Investors was named to its annual Founder-Friendly Investors list, honoring the venture capital and private equity firms with the best track record of success backing entrepreneurs.

The final list recognizes firms that entrepreneurs can trust and collaborate with while receiving the financial support they need to help accelerate growth. QED’s inclusion highlights its successful track record of remaining actively involved in portfolio companies after initial investments.

“QED is thrilled to again be named to Inc.’s list of founder-friendly investors,” said QED Investors Managing Partner, Nigel Morris. “Our brand promise is to provide the best advice in fintech and we take immense pride in offering far more than capital alone. QED’s investment team has more than 250 years of combined experience starting, building and scaling successful companies out of the ground, and we are uniquely positioned to help our founders along every step of their entrepreneurial journeys.

“In today’s economic environment, more than ever before, founders can benefit greatly from the practical, nuanced support and guidance that specialist VCs of ex-operators can uniquely provide.”

QED has exclusively invested in fintech since its inception in 2007 and has played a crucial part in the growth of some of today’s fintech behemoths including Credit Karma (QED led its Series A round in 2009), Remitly (QED led its Series A in 2014), Nubank (QED participated in its Series A in 2014) and AvidXchange (QED participated in its Series B in 2014).

QED has been a leader in the fintech investing community throughout fintech’s evolution, having guided and grown these companies and others through the ecosystem’s boom. QED has invested in more than 200 companies across 16 countries worldwide, backing a total of 27 unicorns, the majority of which were at the pre-seed, seed or Series A stage.

To compile the list, Inc. went straight to the source: entrepreneurs who have sold to private equity. Founders filled out a questionnaire about their experiences partnering with venture capital and private equity firms and shared data on how their portfolio companies have grown during these partnerships.

To see the complete list, click here.
‍

About QED Investors

QED Investors is a global leading venture capital firm based in Alexandria, Va. Founded by Nigel Morris and Frank Rotman in 2007, QED Investors is focused on investing in disruptive financial services companies worldwide. QED Investors is dedicated to building great businesses and uses a unique, hands-on approach that leverages its partners’ decades of entrepreneurial and operational experience, helping companies achieve breakthrough growth. Notable investments include AvidXchange, Bitso, ClearScore, Current, Creditas, Credit Karma, Kavak, Klarna, Konfio, Loft, Mission Lane, Nubank, QuintoAndar, Remitly and SoFi.

Contact‍

Ashley Marshall
Director, PR and Communications
QED Investors
(518) 577-9984

‍

ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- Inc. today announced QED Investors was named to its annual Founder-Friendly Investors list, honoring the venture capital and private equity firms with the best track record of success backing entrepreneurs.

The final list recognizes firms that entrepreneurs can trust and collaborate with while receiving the financial support they need to help accelerate growth. QED’s inclusion highlights its successful track record of remaining actively involved in portfolio companies after initial investments.

“QED is thrilled to again be named to Inc.’s list of founder-friendly investors,” said QED Investors Managing Partner, Nigel Morris. “Our brand promise is to provide the best advice in fintech and we take immense pride in offering far more than capital alone. QED’s investment team has more than 250 years of combined experience starting, building and scaling successful companies out of the ground, and we are uniquely positioned to help our founders along every step of their entrepreneurial journeys.

“In today’s economic environment, more than ever before, founders can benefit greatly from the practical, nuanced support and guidance that specialist VCs of ex-operators can uniquely provide.”

QED has exclusively invested in fintech since its inception in 2007 and has played a crucial part in the growth of some of today’s fintech behemoths including Credit Karma (QED led its Series A round in 2009), Remitly (QED led its Series A in 2014), Nubank (QED participated in its Series A in 2014) and AvidXchange (QED participated in its Series B in 2014).

QED has been a leader in the fintech investing community throughout fintech’s evolution, having guided and grown these companies and others through the ecosystem’s boom. QED has invested in more than 200 companies across 16 countries worldwide, backing a total of 27 unicorns, the majority of which were at the pre-seed, seed or Series A stage.

To compile the list, Inc. went straight to the source: entrepreneurs who have sold to private equity. Founders filled out a questionnaire about their experiences partnering with venture capital and private equity firms and shared data on how their portfolio companies have grown during these partnerships.

To see the complete list, click here.
‍

About QED Investors

QED Investors is a global leading venture capital firm based in Alexandria, Va. Founded by Nigel Morris and Frank Rotman in 2007, QED Investors is focused on investing in disruptive financial services companies worldwide. QED Investors is dedicated to building great businesses and uses a unique, hands-on approach that leverages its partners’ decades of entrepreneurial and operational experience, helping companies achieve breakthrough growth. Notable investments include AvidXchange, Bitso, ClearScore, Current, Creditas, Credit Karma, Kavak, Klarna, Konfio, Loft, Mission Lane, Nubank, QuintoAndar, Remitly and SoFi.

Contact‍

Ashley Marshall
Director, PR and Communications
QED Investors
(518) 577-9984

‍

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01

Settlement Collapse

Value transfer moves from days - corresponding banking, T+1 securities - to seconds. Working capital tied up in float is released.

02

Cost Collapse

Marginal transaction cost approaches zero: fractions of a cent, versus 1-6% on card and corresponding rails.

03

Programmability

Money becomes an object that carries logic - escrow, splits, rebates, compliance - executed by code, not back offices.

Pure infrastructure with no revenue accrual

Layer-1 chains and general-purpose middleware — outside our circle of competence and typically outside our stage.

Speculative asset creation

NFT platforms, memecoins, prediction markets styled as products — mapping to none of the five functions; structurally uninvestable for us.

Three structural truths cut across all five functions.

(a)

Regulated-first wins

The 2020/21 cycle proved permissionless purity does not survive contact with real financial regulation. GENIUS, MiCA, CLARITY and the UK/Singapore regimes are producing founders who start from “how do we get licensed” and build backwards — precisely the founder profile QED has always preferred.
(b)

Incumbents upgraded, not disintermediated

JPMorgan, Citi, Bank of America and Wells Fargo are jointly building a tokenized-deposit network; Visa launched a stablecoin platform in July 2026; 140+ businesses signed an open stablecoin standard. Banks migrate — and new-generation infrastructure companies own the picks and shovels of that migration.
(c)

Emerging markets feel it first

Every function improves most where the fiat experience is worst: cross-border payments, dollar access, investment product availability, working-capital finance. Those are exactly the geographies where QED has fintech ventures’ deepest footprint. Our geographic distribution is not incidental to the tokenization thesis — it is the thesis.

Trade & working-capital finance

Finkargo( LatAm import finance) and OatFi(B2B working-capital infrastructure) sit directly on flows whose logical settlement layer is stablecoin.

Collateralized digital-asset lending

Tokenized Treasuries, equities and stablecoin holdings as instant, programmable collateral.

On-chain private credt

Maple, Centrifuge and emerging institutional protocols - credit funds migrating to programmable rails.

Why QED is advanced

Credit is QED's craft: distinguishing lending businesses from fintechs pretending to be one, charge-offs earned from charge-offs deferred. On-chain credit is a straight-line extension, not a stretch.