Board Changes & Change of Auditor

Fiinu PLC

29 December 2023

 

29 December 2023

Fiinu Plc

("Fiinu", the "Company" or the "Group")

Board Changes & Change of Auditor

Fiinu, a fintech group, creator of the Plugin Overdraft®, provides an update on its proposed Board changes and change of auditor.

Board changes

On 29 September 2023, the Company announced that David Hopton, Jerry Loy, Huw Evans and Chris Sweeney would leave the Company's Board on 31 December 2023 in the absence of any new potential funding developments. The Company can confirm that Jerry Loy, Huw Evans and Chris Sweeney will step down from the Company's Board with effect from 31 December 2023.  David Hopton has now agreed to remain as Non-executive Chairman, but has agreed to defer his remuneration subject to raising sufficient capital to re-apply for a banking licence.

From 1 January 2024, the Company's Board of Directors will consist of David Hopton (Non-executive Chairman), Simon Leathers (Senior Independent Non-executive Director) and Marko Sjoblom (Founder and Executive Director); Marko will be appointed as Group CEO from that date with his remuneration being deferred, subject to the Company being successful with the re-application process.  The Company will also look to recruit further independent non-executive directors, as appropriate, to satisfy its corporate governance requirements.  Further announcements will be made as appropriate.

Change of Auditor

Mazars LLP has stepped down as auditors following the decision by the Company to appoint an audit firm that is aligned to the current stage of the Company's development.  F. W. Smith, Riches & Co (a member of MGI Worldwide) has been appointed by the Board as the Group's new independent auditor with immediate effect and will undertake the audit for the year-ending 31 December 2023. The re-appointment of F. W. Smith, Riches & Co for the financial year ending 31 December 2024 will be subject to approval by shareholders at the next Annual General Meeting of the Company to be held in 2024.

Maintaining current strategy

As previously announced, the Board's focus remains on raising the necessary capital to support Fiinu 2 Limited's re-application for a UK banking licence with which to launch its  Plugin Overdraft®. Given the steps taken to preserve existing funding,  ahead of making the re-application in order to ensure the required level of technological and regulatory readiness for the business to re-initiate the process, a hiring process will need to be undertaken by the Board. It is not possible at this time to quantify the time period when this will happen.

Further funding requirements

The Company will continue to review all its options in respect of the business, including further discussions to source the additional funding required for it to re-apply to the regulators to re-commence the banking licence application for Fiinu 2 Limited.  As part of the continued review of its cashflow requirements, the Company will look to raise further funding to support at least the 12-month period from the issuance of the 31 December 2023 Report and Accounts, whilst it seeks to raise the capital for the re-application process.  As previously announced the required capital for the re-application process is between £35m - £42m.  Further announcements in respect of the interim funding requirements will be made in due course.

Future Intentions and Strategy

On 29 September 2023, the Company announced an operational and strategic update.  The Company does not intend to change the current strategy and will announce any further updates in due course.

Any fundamental change of strategy that involves the cessation of operations, or the sale of all or substantially all of the Group's business and assets (for example, the Group's technology stack and other intellectual property) would require the approval of shareholders in a general meeting in compliance with AIM Rule 15, but no decision to take this course of action has been made.

Commenting, David Hopton, Chairman of Fiinu, said:

"Although, in the current economic climate, the Directors believe there is a definite need for the Plugin Overdraft® to support customers with their credit needs, funding conditions have remained challenging for businesses at the pre-revenue stage such as Fiinu.

"In such conditions, the Board have had to take some difficult decisions to preserve cash and to give the Company every chance to source the additional funding required for it to re-apply to the regulators to re-commence the banking licence application for Fiinu 2 Limited. The proposed Board changes are also being made to reduce ongoing costs to preserve cash. I would like to put on record the Board's and my own thanks to Chris Sweeney for his tireless efforts to get the Group to the position where, subject to funding being raised, it can relatively quickly re-apply for a banking licence. On behalf of all the Board, I wish Chris and all his colleagues who have left Fiinu well for their future careers .

"Finally, the new Board is committed to keeping our shareholders abreast of any important developments and I thank them for their patience as the Company continues to engage with potential investors as it has been doing for many months."  

Market Abuse Regulation ('MAR') Disclosure

Certain information contained in this announcement would have been deemed inside information for the purposes of Article 7 of the Market Abuse Regulation (EU) No 596/2014 ('MAR'), which is part of UK law by virtue of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, until the release of this announcement.

ENDS

Enquiries:
Fiinu plc Dr. Marko Sjoblom www.fiinu.com	via SPARK
SPARK Advisory Partners Limited (Nomad) Mark Brady / Adam Dawes	Tel: [phone]
SP Angel Corporate Finance LLP (Joint Broker) Bruce Fraser / Ezgi Senturk	Tel: [phone]
Panmure Gordon (UK) Limited (Joint Broker) Stephen Jones / Atholl Tweedie (Corporate Finance) Hugh Rich (Corporate Broking)	Tel: [phone]

About Fiinu

Fiinu, founded in 2017, is a fintech group, that developed the Plugin Overdraft® which is an unbundled overdraft solution that allows customers to have an overdraft without changing their existing bank. The underlying bank Independent Plugin Overdraft® technology platform is bank agnostic, that therefore enables it to serve all other banks' customers. Open Banking allows Fiinu's Plugin Overdraft® to attach ("plugin") to the customer's existing primary bank account, no matter which bank they may use. Fiinu's vision is built around Open Banking, and it believes that it increases competition and innovation in UK banking.

For more information, please visit www.fiinu.com

 

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