Latest news with #Conduit
Sydney Morning Herald
06-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
What's driving the gender gap in our reading habits?
Won't somebody think of the young male novelist? Men, it is said, aren't writing novels any more. Or if they are, they aren't getting published. Or if they are getting published, their books aren't selling, getting noticed or winning prizes. One of the first to lament this apparent decline was American writer Jacob Savage. Armed with a battery of statistics, he claimed in Compact magazine that after 2014 'the doors shut' for male Millennials in the US: 'The literary pipeline for white men was effectively shut down … Diversity preferences may explain their absence from prize lists, but they can't account for why they've so completely failed to capture the zeitgeist.' He claims there's a lost generation of literary men who may not know how to say something genuinely interesting and new. Things got so dire in the mind of British novelist Jude Cook that he decided to set up an independent publishing house, Conduit Books, focussing on literary fiction and memoirs by men: 'overlooked narratives' on 'fatherhood, masculinity, working class male experiences, sex, relationships, and negotiating the 21st century as a man'. Conduit has already cut off open submissions, no doubt besieged with manuscripts. We will see its first titles next year. But is there really a decline and if so, what might have caused it? One reason is that we're still correcting for a very long period when men dominated literary culture. Indeed, that was why the Stella Prize and the Davitt Prize in Australia, the Women's Prize for Fiction in the UK and the Carol Shields Prize in Canada were set up, and I don't yet see any good evidence that they can shut up shop because their work is done. Maybe the perception of decline is because most agents and commissioning editors these days are women. Or maybe, as Savage says, male writers are floundering in their attempts to capture the zeitgeist. But perhaps the simplest explanation is that fewer men and more women are reading fiction. About 80 per cent of fiction sales are to women, who are also the most avid readers. Naturally, they want to read about issues that matter to them. Their reading ranges from literary to popular fiction, with the huge sales of female writers such as Colleen Hoover and the romantasy authors almost entirely driven by women. They are also keen to talk about books, in person and online, and recommend them to friends. No wonder publishers are looking out for more of the same. But why are fewer men reading? Are they discouraged because reading fiction seems to be a solitary pursuit that their peer group doesn't favour? Joseph Bernstein investigated the phenomenon for The New York Times and reckoned that to boost readership, 'it might be a matter of men approaching their reading lives a little more like women do – getting recommendations online from celebrities and influencers, browsing together, forming book clubs'.
The Age
06-08-2025
- Entertainment
- The Age
What's driving the gender gap in our reading habits?
Won't somebody think of the young male novelist? Men, it is said, aren't writing novels any more. Or if they are, they aren't getting published. Or if they are getting published, their books aren't selling, getting noticed or winning prizes. One of the first to lament this apparent decline was American writer Jacob Savage. Armed with a battery of statistics, he claimed in Compact magazine that after 2014 'the doors shut' for male Millennials in the US: 'The literary pipeline for white men was effectively shut down … Diversity preferences may explain their absence from prize lists, but they can't account for why they've so completely failed to capture the zeitgeist.' He claims there's a lost generation of literary men who may not know how to say something genuinely interesting and new. Things got so dire in the mind of British novelist Jude Cook that he decided to set up an independent publishing house, Conduit Books, focussing on literary fiction and memoirs by men: 'overlooked narratives' on 'fatherhood, masculinity, working class male experiences, sex, relationships, and negotiating the 21st century as a man'. Conduit has already cut off open submissions, no doubt besieged with manuscripts. We will see its first titles next year. But is there really a decline and if so, what might have caused it? One reason is that we're still correcting for a very long period when men dominated literary culture. Indeed, that was why the Stella Prize and the Davitt Prize in Australia, the Women's Prize for Fiction in the UK and the Carol Shields Prize in Canada were set up, and I don't yet see any good evidence that they can shut up shop because their work is done. Maybe the perception of decline is because most agents and commissioning editors these days are women. Or maybe, as Savage says, male writers are floundering in their attempts to capture the zeitgeist. But perhaps the simplest explanation is that fewer men and more women are reading fiction. About 80 per cent of fiction sales are to women, who are also the most avid readers. Naturally, they want to read about issues that matter to them. Their reading ranges from literary to popular fiction, with the huge sales of female writers such as Colleen Hoover and the romantasy authors almost entirely driven by women. They are also keen to talk about books, in person and online, and recommend them to friends. No wonder publishers are looking out for more of the same. But why are fewer men reading? Are they discouraged because reading fiction seems to be a solitary pursuit that their peer group doesn't favour? Joseph Bernstein investigated the phenomenon for The New York Times and reckoned that to boost readership, 'it might be a matter of men approaching their reading lives a little more like women do – getting recommendations online from celebrities and influencers, browsing together, forming book clubs'.
Yahoo
12-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Conduit, Braza Group Debut Stablecoin Forex Swaps for Cross-Border Payments in Brazil
Conduit, a stablecoin-focused cross-border payments provider, said on Thursday it has teamed up with Brazil's Braza Group for real-time foreign exchange (FX) swaps between the Brazilian real and major foreign currencies using stablecoins. The service allows users to convert Brazilian real to U.S. dollars or euros and settle transactions in minutes with stablecoins —a sharp departure from the traditional FX infrastructure, where settlement can take up to three days, according to the press release. Braza, which owns Brazil's largest FX bank and processed $67 billion in transactions last year, launched its own real-pegged stablecoin BBRL on XRP Ledger earlier this year. Braza will mint BBRL tokens when a payment originates in Brazil. Conduit then swaps the BBRL for dollar- or euro-pegged stablecoins and delivers the funds to the recipient's bank or wallet abroad. Stablecoins—cryptocurrencies whose values are typically pegged to fiat currencies—have emerged as one of crypto's fastest-growing sectors. Their use in cross-border payments and remittances is expanding rapidly, particularly in developing markets where traditional banking channels can be costly or unreliable. Global bank Citi recently projected the sector could grow from $250 billion to $1.6 trillion by 2030. Meanwhile, U.S. lawmakers are also pushing forward stablecoin-specific regulation, encouraging businesses and financial institutions to explore ways to use stablecoins for payments. "Creating seamless on-ramps between fiat and digital currencies, together with on-chain stablecoin FX swaps, has the potential to completely transform how cross border payments are made,' said Conduit CEO Kirill Gertman. Conduit provides infrastructure that bridges blockchains and traditional financial rails. The Boston-based startup raised $36 million last month and reported $10 billion annualized transaction in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Business Wire
12-06-2025
- Business
- Business Wire
Conduit Announces New Partnership With Braza Group in Brazil For Onchain FX
BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Conduit, a leading cross-border payments platform powered by stablecoins, announced today its partnership with Braza Group, which owns the largest foreign exchange bank in Brazil. Braza Group is Conduit's biggest client in Brazil to date, allowing Conduit customers to transfer currency between Brazilian Reais and American Dollars or Euros and settle in just a few minutes, using Onchain FX where stablecoins pegged to different currencies can be swapped in real time. 'Creating seamless on-ramps between fiat and digital currencies, together with Onchain stablecoin FX swaps, has the potential to completely transform how cross-border payments are made,' said Kirill Gertman, CEO of Conduit. Braza Group processed more than $67 billion in transactions in 2024 and launched its BBRL stablecoin, pegged to the Brazilian Real, in February 2025. Through this innovative new partnership, when a Conduit customer uses the platform to make payments from Brazil to the U.S. or Europe in Brazilian Real, Braza Group will mint a stablecoin, which Conduit can swap for a U.S. or EUR dollar-backed digital currency, completing the transaction with the final recipient. This new partnership strengthens Conduit's mission to build the most seamless and scalable payments network in the world, enabling settlements between Brazil and the U.S. or Europe in just two minutes — a sharp contrast to traditional systems that can take up to three days. By combining Braza Group's liquidity and investments in stablecoins with Conduit's global reach, the partnership unlocks the full potential of Onchain FX at scale. Clients will be able to easily switch between stablecoins and fiat currencies and settle global transactions quickly. 'Creating seamless on-ramps between fiat and digital currencies, together with Onchain stablecoin FX swaps, has the potential to completely transform how cross-border payments are made,' said Kirill Gertman, CEO of Conduit. 'Having Braza Group as a client has been exciting in many ways: seeing Conduit start to gain traction with major banks globally, and they fully embraced the vision of what we could build together, unlocking something truly innovative.' Conduit's platform bridges crypto-native infrastructure with traditional finance, offering nearly instant, programmable global transactions with integrated AML, sanctions screening, and transaction monitoring built in. This new partnership with Braza is the latest in a growing line of major milestones since it launched its platform in September 2023. In late May, it announced a $36 million series A fundraising round, and its transaction volumes surged 16x in 2024, surpassing $10 billion in annualized payment volume. Working with Braza further strengthens two of Conduit's core value propositions, its ability to settle global transactions quickly and efficiently, and provide deep liquidity through its platform to ensure transactions can be settled without constraints. Conduit's platform bridges crypto-native infrastructure with traditional finance, offering nearly instant, programmable global transactions with built-in AML, sanctions screening, and transaction monitoring. This partnership with Braza Group marks the latest in a series of key milestones since the platform's launch in September 2023. In late May, Conduit announced a $36 million Series A fundraising round, and its transaction volumes grew 16x in 2024, surpassing $10 billion in annualized payment volume. Working with Braza Group further strengthens two of Conduit's core value propositions: the ability to settle global transactions quickly and efficiently, and to provide deep liquidity to ensure seamless execution. "Braza Group's investment in the BBRL stablecoin aims to help Brazilians connect with the latest financial innovations on the global stage and enable local businesses to optimize their operations," said Arthur Carvalho, Head of Digital Assets at Braza Group. "Conduit's strong commitment to expanding the benefits of stablecoins globally and creating a more inclusive and transparent financial ecosystem made them a natural partner for us. We believe that many individuals and businesses will benefit from integrating BBRL into Conduit's global payment network.' About Conduit Conduit is a next-generation payment network for businesses that move money across borders. We provide fast, reliable global payments by combining instant local payment rails with the efficiency of stablecoins. With a single API, Conduit connects banks, local payment rails, and blockchains to create a resilient network spanning key markets worldwide — including deep connectivity across Latin America, Africa and Asia. Backed by leading investors, Conduit is redefining how money moves across borders.
Yahoo
30-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Conduit, Palla raise cross-border capital
This story was originally published on Payments Dive. To receive daily news and insights, subscribe to our free daily Payments Dive newsletter. Conduit, which incorporates stablecoins into its cross-border payments network, closed on a $36 million haul from investors this week, the Boston-based company said in a Wednesday press release. The venture capital firms Dragonfly and Altos Ventures led the fundraising round. Palla, which also operates a cross-border payments platform, raised $14.5 million from Revolution Ventures, Y Combinator, Meta Fund and other investors, according to its Wednesday press release. The new funding for the startups, which both offer real-time payments, is expected to help each of them expand into new geographic markets and add more services, their separate press releases said. Cross-border payments are notoriously slow, complicated and expensive, but recent advances in digital payments are allowing a slew of nascent fintechs to offer alternative international payment tools. They aim to challenge legacy players in that arena, such as Swift, MoneyGram, PayPal and Western Union. Conduit 'seamlessly' integrates stablecoins, which are cryptocurrencies pegged to a stable value, with U.S. dollars and other countries' local currencies to offer businesses, the company said in its release. The business aims to be an alternative to Belgium-based Swift, the dominant cross-border payments system. Conduit is led by CEO Kirill Gertman, who is based in the Boston area, according to his LinkedIn profile. The company is also based in Boston and has raised a total of $53 million, said a Conduit spokesperson. The company was founded in 2021 and has about 100 clients, with support from 57 employees, the release said. While Conduit competes with Swift, short for the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, it also connects to that network, as well as other rails, including ACH and Fedwire, plus local currency systems in other countries. Currently, Conduit services are available in the U.K., as well as other parts of Europe, China, Hong Kong, Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, Nigeria, and Kenya, among others. It expects to reach further into Asia and Mexico in the future, per the release. Miami-based Palla, which was founded a year earlier in 2020, has developed a clientele of some 30 financial institutions and fintech distribution partners that incorporate the startup's cross-border payments capabilities into their own offerings, per the press release. The company has raised about $15 million in total, a spokesperson for the startup said. Palla enables its partners to embed instant international payments into their own digital channels by way of APIs, white-label apps and other embedded features, the release said. The company aims to add more partners to its lineup before the end of the year, with plans to expand in Latin America, the Caribbean and beyond those regions. The company also expects to broaden existing payment pathways and open new ones for sending and receiving funds as it launches new product lines and money management tools. 'Our goal has always been to simplify and secure cross-border transfers, giving financial institutions the opportunity to make them faster, safer, and more user-friendly than ever before,' Palla CEO Enrique Perezalonso said in the release. 'This investment will accelerate our growth and further our mission to make international payments seamless and accessible to everyone.' Revolution Ventures, which led Palla's funding round, has poured funding into other noteworthy fintech firms, including Trust & Will, Revolution Money by American Express, Policygenius' Zinna, Rize by Fifth Third Bank and Hello Wallet by Morningstar, according to the investor's website. In addition to the capital infusion, Palla said David Golden, managing partner at Revolution Ventures, and Heidi Miller, former president of JPMorgan International, will join Palla's board of directors, according to the press release. The cross-border companies may face additional costs as they seek to expand. U.S. lawmakers are weighing whether to tax cross-border remittances. Last week, the House of Representatives passed a budget bill that would tax cross-border money transfers. The Senate hasn't voted on the bill yet, but fintech groups, including Financial Technology Association, American Fintech Council and Electronic Transactions Association, have already decried the legislation. Erreur lors de la récupération des données Connectez-vous pour accéder à votre portefeuille Erreur lors de la récupération des données Erreur lors de la récupération des données Erreur lors de la récupération des données Erreur lors de la récupération des données
