Stoa, a UK-based FinTech that helps consumers and SMEs draw everyday value from dormant deposits, has secured $2.4m in pre-seed funding to scale its cash management platform.
Bespokeist Partners and Ingenii Capital co-led the investment, which also drew backing from Force Over Mass Capital and Fuel Ventures. A group of senior angels from the financial services world joined the round as well, among them Suneel Hargunani, previously of Citi, and Rachel Sestini, a partner at Shaw Gibbs group and co-founder of Canopy Capital, along with other figures from major global institutions.
The startup’s proposition blends behavioural finance with embedded banking infrastructure and merchant partnerships, positioning itself as a fresh distribution and engagement layer connecting banks, brands and their customers. The service has already gone live in the UK for both individual and business users. Savers can lock money into fixed-term “Stoa Pots” and, instead of depending purely on conventional interest, immediately receive perks and rewards from participating brands. Funds sit with regulated banking partners, and eligible balances carry FSCS protection.
According to the company, attitudes towards cash are shifting quickly. It points to over £600bn sitting in low-yield or non-interest-bearing consumer accounts across the UK, plus a further £250bn-plus in SME reserves. Across the Atlantic, Stoa reckons more than $1trn is parked in low or zero-interest SME accounts in the US, with considerably more spread across consumer current and checking accounts.
The firm is already building partnerships and holding strategic conversations in the US as it plans its entry into that market alongside continued UK growth.
Stoa has put together a cross-functional team with backgrounds in banking, FinTech, marketing and technology, drawing talent from firms such as Octopus Investments, Starling Bank, Vodafone, Oracle, Nationwide Building Society, Lloyds Banking Group and Three UK.
John Mountain, the former CEO and co-founder of Starling Bank, has also recently come on board as an advisor, helping steer product innovation and growth across financial institutions and merchant distribution. The company reports strong inbound demand from banks and merchants keen to use its model to lift engagement, grow deposits, boost retention and generate new value for their customers.
Stoa co-founder and CEO Mike Saraswat said, “The future of cash management is not just about interest rates.
“People want choice, tangible value, and a clearer sense of how their money is working for them. Stoa is creating a new experience around idle cash, one that rewards customers upfront while keeping eligible deposits protected through regulated banking infrastructure. For financial institutions, Stoa helps attract larger deposits for longer. For merchants, it helps reduce churn, deepen customer loyalty, and lower reliance on card processing fees.”
Stoa co-founder and CTO Sam Goodenough said, “We’ve built a modular and composable architecture that banks and merchants can plug into directly or expose through their own channels. The result is that partners can offer Stoa Pots as a native part of their own product set, turning idle deposits into a genuine engagement and retention tool. And when customers securely link their bank account through open banking, smart algorithms read spending and saving patterns to shape even sharper, more personalised offers.”
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