- London-founded information provider is building the AI analytics platform to organise the $141TN debt capital markets, in Europe and the US
- 9fin has raised $72m in two years as demand for high quality information on the biggest asset class in the world soars
- Highland Europe will take a seat on 9fin’s board
2 Dec 2024: 9fin – the AI-powered analytics platform for debt markets – has closed a $50m Series B round led by Highland Europe, with participation from existing investors Spark Capital and Redalpine, Seedcamp, 500 Startups and Ilavska Vuillermoz Capital. The funding will further drive 9fin’s mission to transform one of the world’s largest asset classes through cutting-edge tech, world-class talent and market expansion.
Transforming debt markets through technology
Founded in 2016, 9fin was born out of frustration with the inefficiencies and outdated processes of today’s debt markets. At $141 trillion in assets, debt markets are nearly 25% larger than equity markets, yet equity markets have benefited from greater innovation and rollout of intelligence tools. In contrast, debt capital market teams have been analysing data using the same methods since the 1980s, with opaque fragmented data and manual processes.
The demand for sophisticated financial tools is accelerating, with global spending in the financial data market exceeding $42bn in 2023 (up 12% from 2022). Credit markets create some $58bn of debt deal fees per annum, creating a high stakes market where speed of information is critical. Meanwhile private credit markets are growing as alternative lenders step into the gap left by investment banks. Annual fees for advising on debt transactions have outpaced fees earned by M&A transactions and IPOS.
Co-founder and CEO Steven Hunter and co-founder and CTO Huss El-Sheikh, having both worked in credit markets for JPMorgan and Deutsche Bank respectively, started 9fin to solve the problems that they had encountered when working with archaic systems. From inception, 9fin has put technology at the core of its business providing a fully integrated platform which is designed to help investment bankers and advisers, fund managers, traders, credit analysts and lawyers search, filter and analyse millions of data points to get AI-driven insights and real-time market updates.
9fin was the first information provider for the sector to leverage generative AI as part of its tools, creating agentic Q&A capabilities that allow users to seamlessly query hundreds of thousands of articles, datasets, and earnings transcripts.
Trusted by customers and employees alike
9fin is working with 170 of the world’s largest debt firms, helping them to save time, win business, and outperform their peers who continue to use traditional information tools. This includes nine of the top 10 investment banks, four of the top 5 distressed debt advisors, four of the top 6 law firms, and asset managers with a combined AUM of over $17 trillion.
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