FinTech LIQID closes €33 million financing with Tosca Private Investments Fund

Berlin — Berlin-based digi­tal asset mana­ger LIQID has closed a finan­cing round and recei­ved 33 million euros for its further growth. This is one of the largest sums inves­ted in a German FinTech company to date. The main inves­tor is Tosca­fund Asset Manage­ment LLP, a London-based multi-asset alter­na­tive invest­ment company that mana­ges more than $4 billion. Exis­ting inves­tors, inclu­ding Project A, HQ Trust and Dieter von Holtz­brinck Ventures, also parti­ci­pa­ted in the finan­cing round.

With its invest­ment through Tosca Private Invest­ments Fund (“TPIF”), Tosca­fund beco­mes a signi­fi­cant share­hol­der in the fast growing FinTech. TPIF sees itself as a private equity inves­tor with a focus on small and medium-sized compa­nies in the Euro­pean finan­cial services sector. The tran­sac­tion is subject to appr­oval by BaFin.

LIQID was foun­ded in 2016 and posi­ti­ons itself as a digi­tal alter­na­tive to the tradi­tio­nal private bank. In close part­ner­ship with HQ Trust, the multi-family office of the Harald Quandt family, the company offers clients access to alter­na­tive asset clas­ses such as private equity in addi­tion to asset manage­ment, start­ing with a mini­mum invest­ment of EUR 100,000. Just under two years after its launch, LIQID mana­ges almost 300 million euros for its customers.

Chris­tian Schnei­­der-Sickert, CEO and co-foun­­der of LIQID, sees the reason for the rapid growth in a clear custo­mer focus and the active support of his inves­tors: “Our inves­tors have been decisive in support­ing the deve­lo­p­ment of LIQID and helping us to gain the trust of inves­tors. We are plea­sed to have found such a strong and inter­na­tio­nally expe­ri­en­ced part­ner in TPIF, with whose help this deve­lo­p­ment can conti­nue.” With TPIF’s active support, he said, it will be possi­ble to expand LIQID’s tech­no­logy plat­form as well as its range of services in Germany and beyond.

Fabri­zio Cesa­rio, Part­ner of Tosca­fund, is looking forward to the enga­ge­ment: “We are very happy to support the exis­ting share­hol­ders and the team of LIQID with our capi­tal and our exper­tise in the Euro­pean finan­cial services indus­try. This invest­ment fits perfectly with our long and successful history of finan­cing the growth of excep­tio­nally inno­va­tive compa­nies. Tech­no­lo­gi­cal change will funda­men­tally trans­form the finan­cial indus­try and LIQID is leading the way.”

George Koulou­ris, Part­ner at Tosca­fund, adds: “We see strong growth pros­pects in serving high net worth indi­vi­du­als across Europe. LIQID’s award-winning plat­form clearly stands out from the compe­ti­tion thanks to its unique combi­na­tion of tech­no­logy, profes­sio­nal invest­ment stra­te­gies and human exper­tise. In our view, LIQID is ideally tail­o­red to the needs of wealthy custo­mers. The busi­ness model is highly scalable and has great poten­tial for the entire Euro­pean market.”

LIQID was advi­sed by Roth­schild & Co. and TPIF by Herax Partners.

About LIQID
LIQID is an inde­pen­dent digi­tal asset mana­ger that offers its clients access to invest­ment stra­te­gies, asset clas­ses and condi­ti­ons previously reser­ved exclu­si­vely for high-net-worth indi­vi­du­als. The Berlin-based company works closely with the invest­ment team of HQ Trust, the multi-family office of the Harald Quandt family. On an intui­tive digi­tal plat­form, LIQID has digi­ta­li­zed asset manage­ment in a consis­tent and user-friendly way.

LIQID offers three diffe­rent invest­ment styles tail­o­red to indi­vi­dual client needs and based on a long-term invest­ment philo­so­phy proven over seve­ral market cycles. In addi­tion, LIQID clients gain low-cost access to leading private equity funds.

Since its launch in 2016, LIQID has recei­ved nume­rous indus­try awards. In 2017, the company was named Best German Late-Stage FinTech at the FinTech Germany Awards. The inde­pen­dent ranking insti­tute first­five awarded LIQID in 2016, 2017 and 2018 for outstan­ding perfor­mance in the manage­ment of its client port­fo­lios. In 2018, the busi­ness maga­zine brand­eins awarded LIQID the title of “Inno­va­tor of the Year” while Capi­tal put LIQID in first place in a compa­ri­son of robo-advi­­sors. LIQID was also awarded the German Brand Award for outstan­ding brand manage­ment in the banking and finan­cial services sector.

About Tosca­fund Asset Management
Tosca­fund Asset Manage­ment LLP is a London-based invest­ment company specia­li­zing in alter­na­tive multi-asset invest­ments and curr­ently mana­ges over four billion US dollars. The company was foun­ded in 2000 by Martin Hughes and has estab­lished itself as one of the leading Euro­pean inves­tors in the finan­cial services sector.

In addi­tion to its main fund, Toscafund’s acti­vi­ties include equity finan­cing for small and medium-sized enter­pri­ses, private loan finan­cing and invest­ments in commer­cial real estate. Tosca­fund has many years of expe­ri­ence in growth finan­cing of fast growing compa­nies. Invest­ments in the finan­cial services sector include Alder­more Bank, Hoist, Atom Bank, OakN­orth and Esure.

TPIF, Toscafund’s latest initia­tive, targets invest­ments in Euro­pean unlis­ted finan­cial and service compa­nies. TPIF is led by Fabri­zio Cesa­rio and George Koulou­ris, who joined Tosca­fund as part­ners in 2017. After Plurimi Wealth, the invest­ment in LIQID is the second invest­ment of TPI