Financing global scale and stablecoin payment infrastructure
NALA is a global stablecoin payments infrastructure company connecting emerging markets across Africa and Asia to increase economic opportunity for businesses and individuals.
Through its consumer app and Rafiki, its B2B payments API, NALA gives businesses and individuals access to 249+ banks and 26 mobile money services across 16 countries, moving money between digital dollars and local currencies with faster settlement and better FX efficiency than traditional rails allow.
NALA's business began doubling every other quarter, driven largely by word-of-mouth. But the same growth exposed a hard constraint: pre-funding customer wallets ate working capital faster than the company could replenish it.
To unlock the next phase, NALA secured up to $50 million in credit financing from Liquidity, structured through Mars Growth Capital, the joint venture between Liquidity and MUFG Bank, Ltd. The initial $25 million facility carries a scale-up option of at least another $25 million. The deal shows how Liquidity's founder-focused approach and AI-driven infrastructure can build a bespoke facility for a business operating at the frontier of payments infrastructure.
Profile: NALA
- Industry - Payments
- Headquarters - New York
- Founded - 2021
- Reach - 500,000 customers, 249+ banks and 26 mobile money services across 16 countries
- Core offering - A global payment platform using stablecoin infrastructure for faster settlement and improved FX efficiency
THE CHALLENGE: FUNDING EXPANSION ACROSS APAC WITHOUT DILUTION
Founded in 2021 by Benjamin Fernandes, NALA built its early traction on a simple promise: cross-border payments that actually move at the speed customers expect. By layering stablecoin rails underneath the user experience, NALA could settle faster and offer better FX than incumbent remittance providers.
The reception was sharp, spurred by a customer-centric focus and a relentless focus on improvement - single-direction payment volumes climbed quickly, and enterprise demand for B2B stablecoin payouts and collections accelerated alongside the consumer app. But every new customer wallet NALA pre-funded was working capital sitting idle until the corresponding flow came back. At scale, the model found itself under strain.
NALA needed a financing structure that was:
- Non-dilutive: the company still holds more than 50% of the capital from its 2024 $40M Series A, so any new capital had to preserve that runway rather than dilute it.
- Bespoke: designed around real-time payment flows, corridor economics and the regulatory texture of compliant stablecoin rails, not adapted from an off-the-shelf venture template.
- Built to scale with the business: capable of growing as volumes increased and new corridors opened.
The goal: pre-fund customer accounts at scale, onboard enterprise contracts set to go live later in 2026, and expand payment corridors across the US, Europe and emerging markets at pace.
THE SOLUTION: A BESPOKE FACILITY FOR A COMPLEX BUSINESS
NALA's business does not fit a standard private credit underwriting model. Compliant stablecoin rails, real-time cross-border settlement, multi-currency pre-funding obligations and corridor-by-corridor regulatory regimes meant Liquidity had to design a completely bespoke facility.
Liquidity's investment team ran extensive bottom-up due diligence, stress-testing NALA's model across a range of scenarios - corridor volume swings, FX movements, settlement timing, enterprise onboarding curves - to size and shape the facility around how the business actually operates.
"Our team structured a facility that accounts for NALA's compliant stablecoin rails, real-time cross-border payments and rapid growth in emerging market corridors. We conducted extensive bottom-up due diligence on NALA, stress-testing the model across a range of scenarios and created a bespoke, highly scalable facility that matches the sophistication of NALA's operations."
- Paul Brodie, Global Head of Investments at Liquidity.
The result was an initial $25 million commitment with a scale-up option of at least $25 million more, sized to absorb growth as new corridors come online rather than forcing NALA back to the table each time volumes step up.
That structuring was a collaboration, not a hand-off. Liquidity's team worked directly with NALA management to co-develop the terms.
"At Liquidity, we partner closely with founders, working alongside teams to design financing around how companies scale in practice. In NALA's case, that meant structuring a facility that can adapt as volumes grow and corridors expand, giving them the flexibility to meet rising demand without friction. We worked closely with management to co-develop a tailored credit solution rather than relying on an off-the-shelf approach."
- Justin Langen, Director at Liquidity.
THE IMPACT: CAPITAL THAT KEEPS UP WITH GROWTH
With the facility in place, NALA can pre-fund customer wallets at the volumes its growth now demands, onboard enterprise contracts going live later in 2026 and expand payment corridors across the US, Europe and emerging markets - without equity dilution.
For NALA’s CEO, Benjamin Fernandes, the deal was as much about the partner as the capital.
"The financing from Liquidity validates our vision of building the definitive stablecoin payments infrastructure for the long term. At some point our business was more than doubling every other quarter, we grew faster than we could handle pre-funding for single direction payments and everything broke. Liquidity came in quickly and were highly flexible, so their tailored capital is a lifeline for us. It provides the cash required for NALA to pre-fund customer accounts and unlock our next phase of growth."
- Benjamin Fernandes, Founder and CEO, NALA
Key outcomes:
- Working capital at the right scale: capacity to pre-fund customer accounts and meet the sharp acceleration in B2B stablecoin demand NALA has seen over the past year.
- Enterprise readiness: funding in place to onboard larger enterprise contracts coming online later in 2026.
- Corridor expansion: runway to deepen presence across the US, Europe and emerging markets without equity dilution.
- A relationship built around how NALA actually works: a financing partner who took the time to understand the business model in depth and structure capital around it, rather than fitting NALA into a standard template.
SCALE GLOBALLY WITH LIQUIDITY
Liquidity invests in visionary growth and mid-market companies around the world, deploying from $10 million to $200 million in flexible, tailored capital designed to accelerate growth.
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